


Caught in a Web of Your Love

by wowwowman3



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man - All Media Types, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: A little bit of spideytorch, Alternate Universes, Bisexual, Bisexual Peter Parker, Explicit Sexual Content, Flirting, Gay, Gay Character, Gay Male Character, Iron Man - Freeform, James Rhodes - Freeform, Karen - Freeform, Loki - Freeform, Love Triangles, M/M, MCU but elements of Marvel Comics, Marvel - Freeform, New Avengers Facility, Pansexual Peter Quill, Post-Civil War, Post-Spider-Man: Homecoming, Romace, Sexual acts between two underage individuals, Shuri is Black Panther, Spider-Man - Freeform, The beginning is chill but it gets spicy and sexual, Underage Drinking, Underage Kissing, Underage Relationship(s), Webbing, aunt may - Freeform, fandoms - Freeform, gender fluid Loki, lgbtq+, mcu - Freeform, peter quill - Freeform, romantic, spideytorch - Freeform, star lord - Freeform, tony stark - Freeform, underage sexual acts, war machine
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-28
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2019-05-14 18:43:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 37
Words: 66,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14775107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wowwowman3/pseuds/wowwowman3
Summary: When high school student Gus Myers finds himself with feelings for two exciting new young men in his life — the famous crimefighting wall-crawler and (sort of) Avenger known as Spider-Man and the new kid Peter Parker that just transferred into his school — he has no clue what kind of messy love triangle he got himself into.





	1. The First Encounter

— ARC 1: BEGINNINGS —

 

Kitty and I were sitting across from each other at our booth in our favorite pizza place: Mariella’s. It was Friday night and it was our tradition to share a large plain pie and an order of garlic knots before going to my house to have a sleepover and watch last night’s _RuPaul’s Drag Race_. We didn’t get as much time together anymore ever since she started dating her new bad-boy Harry, on top of the fact that she went to an all-girls school uptown, so we could only see each other after school and on the weekends.

“He just got a gig at Irving Plaza next month and I’m really excited for him,” Kitty was telling me the latest about Harry’s musical dreams, “Irving Plaza is a really well-known venue and he’s worried he won’t sell the whole place out, but I’m sure he will. Can you help try to spread the word around?”

“Hm? Oh, sure, yeah.” I was distracted by the TV in the corner of the pizza parlor. It showed a live feed of a fight in Madison Square Park between Spider-Man and some new baddie that I had never seen before. It looked like he was fighting a bolt of lightning, only the lightning wasn’t moving. It stood in place and lashed out at Spider-Man. As I looked closer, it looked more like a man made out of electricity. His eyes glowed a bright white color and his body was a duller, more yellow color. Small strands of lightning were randomly shooting off of him, but he was able to make as much lighting as he wanted. The newscasters were calling him, or it, Electro. Their fight was slowly moving downtown, closer to where we were. I hoped they wouldn’t get too close before—

“Gus, what’s up?”

“Just Spider-Man on TV.”

“Ugh these super heroes need to get over themselves. They interrupted _Riverdale_ the other night with a special news broadcast and I missed the twist ending. Anyways, Thor is way hotter.”

“Hey! We don’t know how hot Spider-Man is.”

“Yeah, but he’s a literal twig. Gus, you can’t find that hot.”

“I don’t know, I think his body’s super attractive.”

“Why is that you only find sticks attractive? I’m just glad I have such a broad-shouldered daddy in Harry.”

“We _get it_ you have a boyfriend. You need to get over yourself.” Just then the front windows of Mariella’s shattered and glass showered over us.

“Get to the back of the restaurant everyone! Fast!” Mr. Mariella himself ushered everyone away from the windows, where you could see pure electricity flowing through the air on the street as Spider-Man dodged bolts of lightning while flinging people into the safety of self-made webs on the side of buildings.

“Kitty, get up! Come on!” Kitty was dangerously close to the front window and had a shard of glass in the side of her left leg.

“I can’t walk on it! It hurts too bad!” I quickly scooped her up into my arms and carried her to safety within the back of the restaurant.

“Shit! I left my phone at our booth back at the front! I need to text my mom that I’m okay!” I said.

“Gus, don’t go! If you _go_ you won’t be okay enough to text your mom!”

“I’ll be fine!” I said as I crouched and hurried to the front of the restaurant. Just then, a bolt of lightning entered the restaurant through the shattered windows and crashed down into the pizza display case besides me. The impact of the lightning alone sent me flying through the door and I rolled into the center of the street. I felt Spider-Man’s gaze immediately come down upon me and measure the distance between himself on the side of a building, me, and the electricity guy hovering in the air. He quickly and nimbly propelled himself off the side of the building straight towards me. Before he could get five feet from the building, a bolt of lightning set a path directly for him. But his reflexes were faster. He webbed onto a metal pothole on the street and yanked it out of the ground, propelling it directly towards Electro. The metal attracted the lightning bolt out of the air on its way towards him until it eventually crashed directly into him, sending Electro spinning through the air and against a building on the other side of the street. This gave Spider-Man exactly enough time to scoop me into his arms from the street and swing away from the danger while holding me held tightly in his arms. I wrapped my arms tightly around his lean but muscular body. I could feel his arm free from swinging holding me close to him. I then made the mistake of looking below me and saw the streets of New York City speeding past, twenty stories below. However, it was as if he could sense my fear. He gave me a tight squeeze with the arm that was holding me and a young, energetic, but brave voice reassured me saying,

“It’ll be alright, don’t worry. I got you.”

Just then, a bright blue light enveloped both of us and made our bodies rigid. Before we knew it we crashed against a rooftop of a building nearby. As we fell and rolled onto the rooftop, I felt Spider-Man wrap his entire body around me, protecting me from the brunt of the fall and taking it himself. We must have gotten hit by a lightning bolt. While I was still recovering from the fall, he was on his feet in defensive position against his electric foe.

“I didn’t think the electrician was supposed to come until Tuesday, I guess I got my times wrong,” he quipped as he hurled his body into the air above him, avoiding yet another electric bolt. He flipped through the air and landed flawlessly on top of the building’s water tower, so he was now above Electro.

“Hey, cutie! You’re gonna wanna step back for this!” I realized he was talking to me and blushed intensely, before crawling backwards against the roof’s edge. He shot two lines of webbing from either web shooter down onto the lip of the water tower's roof and yanked backwards, peeling the top of the water tower off of it. “Did I just call you cutie? Well, that’s embarrassing,” he forced out between heavy breaths and grunting. He then flipped backwards while still holding onto the top of the tower with his webs and slammed against the back side of it, sending it tipping over onto Electro, spilling its wet contents all over him. A flash of bright blue light covered the Manhattan skyline as an unlimited source of power short circuited entirely and raw energy disappeared into the air. I squinted my eyes and turned away from the explosion. When the brightness died down, I turned slowly back towards the center of the roof where Electro was once hovering only to find Spider-Man standing over me, enveloping us both in a cocoon of webbing.

“The webbing… insulates… from electricity…” he said between heavy pants. He then collapsed into me and rested his head in my lap, with his arm laid out above his head. “Thanks for all your help today.”

“Help? I did _literally_ nothing. You did all the heavy lifting. Once again, literally.”

“Yeah, but I probably wouldn’t have fought as hard as I did if I wasn’t trying to impress you.”

I blushed and looked away from large white eyes in his mask only to notice that his costume was in tatters from the explosion. I could clearly see his defined muscular body underneath his suit. His chiseled chest had one large burn starting from its center and covering almost the entire right side of his torso. It crept down his body and outlined his abs, which were bruised from the fall that he took for me.

“My eyes are up here, pal.” Spider-Man said, noticing my gaze.

“Wow, so we’ve gone from cutie to just pal?” I remarked in response.

“And he’s funny too!” He said weakly. I could tell all he wanted was a rest.

“No need to keep trying to look good in front of me anymore, Spidey. You did a pretty great job.” I glanced at his abs that seemed to be staring into my soul with their attractiveness. “And to be honest the main reason you don't need to keep trying to look good is because I have clear view of your abs right now."

Just then we felt the canopy of webbing around us wobble as we heard the sound of an approaching helicopter. 

“Ugh, why do the police come _every_ time I’m sharing a tender moment with someone that I saved?” Spider-Man said as he pulled the web tarp off from above us, forcing us to face reality once again. “Hopefully I’ll see you around?”

“If I have to put myself in another deathly situation for that to happen, I’ll be a happy volunteer.” I responded.

“Hey, don’t joke about that! I may look good all bruised and burned, but I like seeing you safe… cutie.” He abruptly rolled off the side of the building like a limp, dead body and my stomach dropped, fearing that he lost his sense of reasoning in the fight too. As I gazed over the edge I saw him shoot a web line out and swing down 5th Avenue.

“See you around, Spidey.”


	2. New Kid in School

I spent most of that night with Kitty in the emergency room. She only needed a few stitches and a prescription for an antibiotic but it took forever. However, it gave me plenty of time to tell her _everything_ that had happened with Spider-Man that night.

“Oh my god, Gus, Spider-Man totally has a crush on you!”

“I don’t know, he was probably hallucinating after being hit in the head too hard or something and thought I was a girl. I’m sure he doesn’t actually think I’m a ‘cutie’.” I said.

“Well, I’m declaring that he definitely does. You better run into him again sometime soon. Imagine if you dated Spider-Man!” Kitty squealed.

“Let’s just get you home.” I took an Uber home with Kitty so she wouldn’t have to walk on her hurt leg and we had our usual sleepover and _RuPaul’s Drag Race_ viewing party. The rest of the weekend breezed by like it usually does and before I knew it, it was Monday morning and I had to drag myself to school. I had English first period and then class meeting in the library, where I met up with Liz, Mels, and Sam. They were my three best friends at school.

“Guys you will never _guess_ what happened Friday night.” I blurted out as I sat down at our table.

“You got saved by fucking Spider-Man we know!!!!” Mels chimed in immediately.

“Wait, how do you know?” I asked.

“You were on the news, Gus,” Liz explained, “Everyone is talking about the boy Spider-Man saved then chilled in a web cocoon with for, like, 10 minutes after the fight.”

“Wait, what?” I said, surprised.

“Have you been on Buzzfeed at all this weekend? Everyone is calling you Spider-Boy.” Sam said nonchalantly.

“This is crazy. I had no idea.” 

“But what happened in the cocoon??” Mels begged, “Did you touch his Spider-Dick???”

“Oh my god, Mels, no! He did call me ‘cutie’ during the fight though.” I said, trying to brush it off like it was no big deal.

“He did _what_???” They all shouted in unison. I explained to them everything that happened.

“Oh my god #teamGusder-Man all the way,” Liz decided.

“Oh god, is Gusder-Man our ship name now?” Just then Bill, our Upper School Head, asked us all to quiet down.

“Hey everyone, I want to introduce a new student to the grade. This here is Peter Parker.” Peter was shorter than me with wavy brown hair that curled at the ends. He was wearing a blue sweater over a plaid button-up shirt and baggy jeans. He had big, brown eyes and a cute, angular nose. His ears kinda stuck out from his head but in a sweet way and he clenched his mouth shut nervously, making it look like there was something stuck inside his mouth.

“He’s coming from Midtown School of Science and Technology,” Bill continued, “Which is way uptown for some reason, but anyways, everyone please warmly welcome Peter into the senior class!” There were half-hearted scattered claps from the grade as the boy standing in front of us nervously shuffled off to the side, but not before tripping over a chair and falling flat on his face. He sprung back up surprisingly quickly and hurried into a chair at an empty table in the side of the library. As he sat down we made eye contact, and his eyes instantly grew wide with fear and he looked quickly away and kept his head down.

“Hey did you guys just see that?” I asked my friends.

“See what?” Sam responded.

“That new Peter kid just made eye contact with me and looked terrified,” I said.

“He’s probably just scared of how famous you are as Spider-Boy now.” Mels said.

The rest of the day went by uneventfully, despite the multitude of classmates of mine who called me Spider-Boy and all wanted to know whether or not it got steamy in the cocoon with Spider-Man, to which I rolled my eyes, while secretly hoping that did happen.

As I was leaving school, I was texting Kitty about the whole Spider-Boy phenomenon when I saw the new kid Peter struggling to open up his locker. I walked over to him and said,

“You really have to bang it hard before it can open” I slammed my hand against his locker for him and it popped open, showering him in disorganized papers and textbooks. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry! I shouldn’t have opened it so quickly.” I said as I leaned down to help him pick up his papers.

“Uhhh, it’s fine, don’t worry about it.” He was furiously picking up the papers and stuffing them, crumpled, into his backpack. As I helped him, I saw a small silver cartridge that slid underneath the lockers.

“Is this yours?” I handed it to him and his face drained of color as he violently took it out of my hand and shoved it in his pocket before running out of school.

“What’s his deal with me?” I thought to myself. I left school and saw him fast walking down the block before sharply turning into an alley. I followed him, wondering where he was going, and looked into the alley only to find it completely empty. I decided to leave my suspicions to the side and started on my way home.

The next day at school, Liz, Mels, Sam, and I were talking in the cafeteria when we saw Peter enter.

“Hey Gus look it’s your #1 fan,” Mels said, gesturing at Peter.

“You know what it is," Liz said, "I bet he has a crush on you.”

“What?? He does not!” I protested. But I had to admit, thinking about the super cute new boy having a crush on me wasn’t the worst thing in the world, even if he was a little strange.

“Just go talk to him and see how he acts,” Sam suggested.

“Maybe… I don’t know. I’m gonna get more food does anyone want anything?” I asked.

“Um, can you get me some orange juice from the juice machine?” Mels asked.

“Sure thing.” I got up and walked over to the basket of packaged cereals and looked for the Cinnamon Apple Cheerios but they were already all out, so I went for plain Cheerios instead. When I went to the beverage area for Mels, I found Peter standing in the center of it looking at his phone. I glared back at all of my friends who were snickering and encouraging me to talk to Peter; they had obviously just asked me to get Mels juice so that I would be forced to talk to Peter. “Whatever,” I thought to myself, “It can’t hurt to be nice to the new kid.” When I approached him he was FaceTiming a boy with an unfortunate middle part in the center of a thick, brown head of hair.

“Yo, so has he, like, noticed at all that you’re...  _you_?” The boy asked Peter. Peter glanced up at me and once again his eyes grew wide with fear.

“Uh, talk later Ned, gotta go. Can’t talk anymore got some more, uh, homework to do.”

“Is that—“ Ned was cut off by Peter ending the FaceTime call. We both blankly stared at each other with our mouths partly open, waiting for the other to say something first.

“I’m G—“ I was cut off my Peter simultaneously saying,

“I’m Pe—“ Another moment of silence filled the air before we both laughed.

“I’m Gus. I wanted to introduce myself and lend my hand in case you wanted a friend or anything here.”

“Oh, that’s so kind of you. Yeah, it might be a good idea to make a few new friends rather than just FaceTime my best friend every day. Oh, I’m Peter, by the way.”

“Haha yeah I kinda already got that…” I said.

“Right. Of course. Sorry. With my big introduction and then falling-flat-on-my-face thing yesterday, how could I forget?” Peter said, looking down at his feet nervously.

“Nonono, it’s fine. I’m sure nobody noticed.”

“And by nobody you mean all of the people that have already nicknamed me ‘Face-Plant Parker’?”

“What?! Who’s doing that?” I said, shocked.

“You know, the usual suspects of stuck-up mommy’s boys.” I laughed. “It’s better than my nickname at my old school, though.”

“Oh really? What was that?” He looked from side to side, making sure nobody else around could hear before finally admitting in a hushed whisper,

“Penis Parker.” I burst out into laugher and said,

“That’s too good! I’m sorry, that’s so awful of me for laughing, but I can’t help it!”

“Haw haw, very funny. Get your laughs out now. I get it, 'Penis Parker'. The humor of a fourth grader, classic.”

“Why’d they call you that? I bet your penis has to be pretty memorable to get a whole nickname based off of it.” I said jokingly.

“What? No!” He blushed and looked away. “It was more just a tease-y thing saying that I’m as bad as a penis.” Peter said, embarrassed.

“That’s ridiculous! Penises are the best! Screw those losers, they don’t know what they’re missing out on. I’d be honored to be called a penis every day.” He looked up at me and smiled bashfully. Our eyes locked and we held each others gaze for a brief moment before he looked away and said,

“Well, I really do have some AP Bio homework to catch up on, I barely had any time to do homework last night. See you around, Gus.”

“See ya… Penis Parker.”

“Oh my god, shut up before the mommy’s boys hear you!” He said as he jokingly looked around in a defensive position. He spun quickly around on his heel and stumbled out of the cafeteria, slipping on a spilled glass of apple juice as he left. I burst into laughter and he turned around towards me with a look of fake annoyance and genuine embarrassment before successfully leaving. I turned back to my friends who all gave me a small standing ovation for my conversation with him. Sam was the first to speak.

“Dude, did I just, like, witness a wedding?”

“Actually, though, your chemistry was in _sane_ ,” Liz confirmed.

“And can we talk about how you flirted with him about his dick?? Like that’s some A+ flirting work right there,” Mels commented.

“I was _not_ flirting about his dick.” I said. Everyone raised an eyebrow at me and Mels said,

“What would you call ‘oh you must have a giant dick if people called you Penis Parker’?”

“That’s not what I said!” I protested.

“Yeah, but, like, translated using the dictionary of flirting, that’s basically what you said,” Sam confirmed.

“You guys are impossible, there was nothing there.” But at the back of my mind I felt something, and couldn’t help thinking about the cute and funny Penis Parker as more than just a friend.


	3. Tension Builds

Peter and I continued to have little moments at school that brought us closer together. In AP Bio we were partnered up for a photosynthesis lab using spinach leaves and he accidentally knocked over our entire experimental procedure while flailing his arms in a hilarious attempt to mimic his aunt searching for her keys when leaving the house in the morning, sending carbon dioxide-infused water and small discs of spinach spilling all over both of us and the table. We were forced to stay late after class to clean up our mess. As everyone was heading out of class, Peter got us some rolls of paper towels to clean with.

“I’m really sorry about this, Gus, this was all me you should go enjoy your lunch.”

“No! It’s totally fine! We’rein this together! Anyways I am fully _devoted_ to this spinach lab.” Peter laughed and looked up at me with his large brown eyes, a loose curl falling from his head in front of his face. We locked eyes and I smiled back at him, causing him to quickly look away and push the curl away from his eyes and up into the rest of his hair. As we finished throwing the last of the paper towels into the waste basket, Peter stood up revealing a totally soaked graphic t-shirt that was spelling out “OMG” but with the period table boxes for Oxygen and Magnesium.

“Oh, god. Your shirt is soaked and covered in little bits of spinach lemme just…” I reached out to brush some pieces of spinach off of his shirt directly as he said,

“Oh no it’s fine I have another shirt with me.” He abruptly began lifting his shirt off of his body as I was reaching out to brush it off and my hand made direct contact with his surprisingly defined abs. I was shocked. I mean, I thought Peter was cute before, but this changed my _entire_ perspective on him. I think I kept my hand on there too long because his shirt was fully off and he was looking directly at me, so I pulled my hand back.

“ImsosorryIdidntmean—“

“ItsfinethatwasonmeIshouldhave—“

We both stared at each other and laughed nervously. Peter was bringing his arms in in front of his body to cover up, but it didn’t stop me from seeing how muscular he was. His pecs were incredibly defined and you could see muscles on the side of his rib cage ripple underneath his skin as he moved his toned arms. I realized I was staring and looked down at the table, pretending to be checking it for any last pieces of spinach. I resisted every urge to watch Peter as he put his extra t-shirt from his backpack back on, but I admit I stole a glance as the t-shirt covered his face while going over his head.

“Well I’d better run and meet up with Liz, Mels, Sam, and Francesca, but I’ll see you around?”

“Yeah! I’ll see you around partner! Like… lab partner… with the spinach…”

“Yeah, got it… Well, I’ll see ya!” I left the room but not without saying as the door closed behind me, “Penis Parker.”

I heard a faint, “Come on!” from behind me as I walked down the hallway. I also heard Peter say to himself, “Damn it, Parker, ‘lab partner’? That wasn’t funny at all.”

I smiled to myself knowing that maybe Peter was having the same thoughts about me that I was about him.


	4. Secret Admirer

That night Kitty and I got dinner and I filled her in on _everything_.

“Oh my god. Gus. Why are two extremely attractive men (well Spider-Man could be totally deformed but that’s not the point) with KILLER abs both in love with you?”

“I have no idea but I’m living for it.”

“It’s actually crazy though from your descriptions it’s like both Spider-Man and Peter have like the same exact abs I bet you must just attract guys with one specific type of ab.”

“And what type’s that?”  
“The perfect type. I mean not even Harry has abs his stomach is sort of just flat but it’s the perfect body.”

“Hey I thought you just said my guys have the perfect body!”

“Perfect _abs_ , I still win getting the guy with the perfect _body_ all in all.”

I walked Kitty to her train station on my way home and as we were walking we heard a familiar swoosh above us.

“Gus! It’s your man!”

“What?” I looked up and found Spider-Man swinging across 14th street directly above us. He didn’t seem to be in a hurry at all. In fact, he seemed to be trying to go the same pace Kitty and I were.

“Spidey! Down here!! Look remember this ‘cutie’?” Kitty shouted out to Spider-Man

A few teenager girls next to us muttered to each other while eyeing me and I was sure I heard them say “Spider-Boy” multiple times.

“Kitty, shut up! He can’t hear you and he definitely doesn’t care! Also as much as I love the newfound attention I’m getting I’d rather not have people be talking about me as Spider-Boy pretending I’m not standing directly next to them” As I said that Spider-Man turned on 6th Avenue and swung away. “See? It was just a coincidence.”

We continued our way home and, as I was saying bye to Kitty, I swear I heard a ‘thwip’ above me, but when I looked nothing was there. I shook the strange feeling away and went home for the night.


	5. Friday Night Fun

It was a Friday and there was word going around that there was going to be a party at this girl in my grade Sarah’s house that night and me and all my friends were going. During lunch I saw Peter eating in the cafeteria alone so I decided going to a party with him would be the perfect way to hang out in a much more loose boundaries way and see if he really did have any feelings for me.

“Hey penis boy!” I said as I walked up to him. He looked around and stifled a laugh as he tried to not let food spill out of his mouth.

“Gus, there are teachers around you gotta be more careful!”

“Oh who cares they gave us a vocab quiz about genitals in sixth grade I think they’d be happy to know we’re retaining our knowledge.”

“Oh and what knowledge is that?”

“Well the penis is the sex organ used to transport semen during sexual intercourse.” We held eye contact for a prolonged amount of time after I said that until we both awkwardly laughed and Peter blushed and looked down at his food. I think I may have taken the flirting too far. “Anyways Sarah is having a party tonight and you should come!”

“Am I invited?”

“Yeah anyone can show up just meet me and Mels and Liz and Sam there at 10! It starts at 9 but parties never get fun until 10.”

“Alright I’ll, uh, I’ll see if I can make it.”

“Oh you need the address can I have your number so I can text you it?”

“Sure thing.” He gave me his number and we said our goodbyes. I couldn’t wait until 10 PM.

Before I knew it Mels, Liz, and I were mixing and mingling with all the people in our grade. I brought Kitty along too and we were going to head to my house after to watch Drag Race after the party.

“Gus, is Peter here yet??” Kitty asked.

“I don’t think so...” I said as I peered my head around the crowded New York City apartment. Just then I saw his wavy brown haired-head bobbing among the rest of the underage drinkers in the front hallway. “Wait there he is!”

“Oh my god go talk to him now! Bring him a drink to loosen him up a bit.” Kitty said as she handed me a red solo cup of cheap beer.

“Oh my god, Kitty you’re ridiculous” I said as I still took the drink from her hand. I walked across the room until I found him nervously looking around. “Hey Peter!” He looked up at me and looked instantly relieved.

“Thank god I found you I was afraid you ditched me here.”

“Thanks so much for coming! Here’s a drink!”

“Oh... I don’t, uh, I don’t drink.”

“Oh that’s fine don’t worry about it!”

“Yeah, I uh… I, uhm, drove here, yeah. So it’s pretty unsafe for me to drink and drive, you know.”

“You drove here? To an apartment? In Manhattan?”

“Uhhhh yeah, totally.”

“I’ll take it!” A random girl next to us from another school said who was way to drunk for her own good.

“So is this what parties are normally like?”

“What have you never been to one before?”

“Well, I went to one, but I kinda had to leave early.”

“Well hopefully this one can last all night.” I leaned my arm on the wall behind his head as he leaned against the wall.

“I’d like that.” He looked up at me and smiled, then blushed and quickly looked away. He quickly composed himself then asked me,

“Are they always this crowded though? Maybe we could, uh, I dunno, find some place more away from everyone?” I raised my eyebrows in shock but regained my suave facade I was trying to put on that night.

“Um... yeah I’m pretty sure we can go into one of those rooms down the hall there.” I pointed us past the kitchen and down a hallway that was filled with a pair of kids making out furiously against the wall. All of my friends also happened to be in the kitchen right past the route to the rooms. As we walked by they all looked at me with silent but expressive aces of shock, excitement, and support. Kitty had to cover her mouth as she let a scream slip out and a very drunk Mels began giggling uncontrollably and clung onto Sam for support. As I walked down the hall after Peter, Liz grabbed my hand and quickly whispered in my ear,

“Gus should I get you some condoms I just want you to be safe and everything.”

“Oh my _god_ I don’t even know if we’re gonna kiss. I haven’t even had my first kiss I seriously doubt sex is on the table tonight.”

“Okay text me if you need anything.” I gave Liz a squeeze on the shoulder and rushed down the hall. I was happy to have such great friends looking out for me. I found Peter outside a door to a room at the end of the hall.

“Okay this is the only room that isn’t locked so I’m guessing it’s the only room that doesn’t already have couples making out in them”

“Already?” I asked him, raising my eyebrows.

“What? Uh... I just meant like, cause that’s a thing at parties.” His face went beet red and he opened the door. We were immediately greeted by a child’s room entirely covered in posters of Spider-Man.

“Oh you gotta be kidding me.” Both Peter and I said simultaneously. I looked at him curiously.

“What do you have against Spider-Man?” I asked.

“It’s nothing against I love him! It’s just uh...” There was a pause that was suspiciously too long. “I mean you’re Spider-Boy it’s kind of hard to have to be faced with your competition in a situation like this.”

“Why would it matter if I am Spider-Boy, and how does that make him your competition?” I asked, tauntingly, “And what do you mean by situation like this?” I slowly walked towards him, leading him towards a bed. 

“Oh, I don’t know... Just that... Maybe...” He sat down on the bed and I sat next to him. He laughed nervously, but then locked eyes with me and smiled. I leaned closer to him, placing my hand on his thigh and our faces just a few inches apart.

“Peter?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you wanna kiss me?”

“Mmhm.” He grabbed the back of my head and slowly pulled my face towards him. I parted my lips slightly and wrapped my eyes around his torso, pulling our bodies close. I could feel his soft breath tickling my face when all of a sudden a flash of light flooded into our room from the window and “BOOM” rattled everything in the room. Before I could even react, he had pushed me off of him and rushed to the window. His eyes grew wide with shock, and then squinted with determination.

“Hey, Gus, do you mind stepping out for a minute I just need some alone time.”

“What? Is there something I did wrong?

“No! It’s not that I swear I just really need you to leave this room right now.”

“I’m sorry if I was too forward! Do you just wanna sit and chat instead? Or do you just wanna check out what’s outside together and make sure everything’s okay before—“ Another “BOOM” cut me off.

“Gus I need you to leave now.”

“Peter I don’t underst—“

“Now!” He was sharp and direct. I had never seen Peter like this. It was as if I was the last of his worries right now and he could care less about my feelings.

“Okay…” I left the room in a hurry. I was hurt, embarrassed, and, most of all, sad. I thought Peter and I had something really special between us and I was really ready to have my first kiss with him. But I didn’t have time to process anything until Kitty rushed up to me.

“Gus thank god you’re okay! There was this giant explosion outside and a bunch of people are hurt. Some people by an open window got thrown across the room by the blast and they’re bleeding really bad. I was so scared you got hurt.” She pulled me in tight and hugged me.

“I’m fine Kitty, don’t worry. Just a lot is going on right now.”

“Is Peter okay?”

“I hope so but it kind of seems like someone else overtook his mind for a second so I don’t know about that.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The second that explosion happened he turned into an asshole and just told me to get out of the room and leave him alone. And we were... we were about to kiss.”

“What the _fuck_??? He can’t just treat you like shit right when you put yourself out there for the world to see. Like if he doesn’t want to kiss you, sure, that’s fine, that’s his choice, but you can’t be an asshole about it. Where is this little bitch he’s gonna pay for being a shit head.” I can never say that I don’t have some loyal friends. Kitty stormed into the room we were just in and we were both shocked to find the window completely open and the room entirely empty.

“Where did he go?” Kitty asked. He must have slipped out while we were too busy being angry at him. We both ran to the window and looked outside, only to find absolute pandemonium in 5th avenue below us. Spider-Man was swinging and leaping from the sides of buildings and the tops of lampposts, avoiding large vibrational blasts coming from a man in an unfortunately styled yellow checker-patterned jacket that almost looked like a quilt, with two large gauntlet blasters on his arms.

“Hey quilt-brain! T.J. Maxx called! They want their fall cozy weather quilt collection back!” Spider-Man quipped as he hurled a group of innocent bystanders into the safety of a web net strung up in a secluded side alley. The sides of the buildings, including the ones we were in, were being torn apart by the teched-out foe. “Hey, haven’t I fought you once before? Oh, that’s right, you’re that Shocker guy, and I beat you then too!”

“You beat me but the NYPD couldn’t keep me down and now here I am to finally squash you like the bug you are!”

“Yawn, isn’t this all a bit cliché? An escaped super villain returns to the public eye to take down the superhero that took them down but in the end they just end up back in jail but with higher security this time? Why don’t you spice up the narrative? Take that outfit of yours to Vogue, I’m sure wearing grandma’s embroidery work is the latest fall fashion tr—“ Spider-Man’s quips were interrupted by a blast of shock waves to the face, sending him hurling into the side of the building across the street form us.

“You can tease my get-up spider, but it just allows me to absorb more shock energy around me, giving my energy blasts more bang for my buck!” The Shocker blasted Spider-Man further into the building across the way.

“Gus let’s get back with everyone else and make sure that they’re all okay.”

“Good idea, Kit.” Kitty and I made our way into the living room. Most of the party had left by now, fleeing the scene of the superpowered battle outside the window. We saw that Mels, Liz, and Sam had all left by now.

“Alright, Gus, let’s head out now is not the time to get involved with Spider-Man’s antics again.”

“Okay, fine, let me just check and see how he’s doing.” I ran over to the window and looked out, only to see Spider-Man swing directly past me, and a ray of shock waves following directly after him. A large screeching and crunching sound filled the air around me until everything stood still.

“Oh my god, Gus, that was a close one. Let’s get home now.” Suddenly, the floor beneath me lurched. I looked down to see that the ground around the window had been carved out by the shock blast and a chunk of the building, the chunk that I was standing on, was slowly sliding out of the side of the building. “Gus!” Kitty shrieked.

“Stay back! Get as far away as you can! I don’t want you to—“ Another lurch sent the mass of concrete, glass, and human body (me) plummeting directly towards the street 28 stories below. I did the only thing I could think of that could save my life and called out, “Spider-Man! HELP!” No response. There were mere feet between me and the pavement below. I rolled myself into a ball and shut my eyes tight, hoping by some miracle I would survive. When I opened them again I was soaring through the air in a pair of arms that were all-too-familiar by now.

“What _is_ it with you and getting in the way of things?”

“Oh, no. _You_ were the one that got in the way of _my_ things tonight.”

“Is that so?” Suddenly our smooth swing turned into a fast fall. The Shocker blasted apart Spider-Man’s web line. He threw me into one of his trusty web nets and returned to the fight. I climbed from the net onto a nearby fire escape and crawled to the ground. I walked away from the fight and the explosions, giving myself time to think about everything that had happened to me that night. Before I knew it, there were no more eardrum-shattering noises coming from 5th avenue and I was walking alone through a quiet New York City night.

“Hey, what scared you away? Was it that crazy guy with those big arm things? You know, he looks all tough and scary from afar but once you get up close to him it’s just like coming face to face with a yellow human-shaped mattress.”

“Your quilt jokes are getting really old tonight, you need some better material.” I turned and came face-to-face with everyone’s favorite wall crawler.

“Hey you try staying positive and coming up with witty quips while simultaneously looking out for your life and the lives of the 100 people near you and see if you can do better.”

“Fair.”

“So, what did I interrupt that was so important tonight?”

“It was nothing.”  
“Come on, you can tell me. It’s not like I’m a complete stranger who no one knows the identity of wearing a mask pretending to be half-man half-spider.” I smiled.

“There’s just this boy at school. I thought we were really clicking and tonight we were about to kiss but then this all happened and he turned into a total asshole.”

“First of all anyone who wouldn’t want to kiss you is an absolute idiot. Second of all I feel threatened knowing that I have competition.”

“So you think he's competition too! He said the _same_ thing.”

“Really? Huh. Funny how that works out. Anyways, I didn’t finish. Third of all, there was a giant explosion right outside where you were. That can be terrifying for some people and he probably just went into self-defense mode or something and wanted to be alone for a bit and that’s why he forced you out. You shouldn’t blame him for acting rashly.”

“Wait how did you know he wanted to be alone?”

“Uhhhh… I mean you said you were about to kiss him so I just sorta guessed you two were off alone somewhere just the two of you.”

“Okay… Anyways I guess that makes sense. I dunno it just sucks putting yourself out there for the first time and nothing coming of it. It’s so hard being gay when all your friends have such an easy time finding boys and girls to be with and it’s instantly 10000 times harder to find anyone to be with cause half the people that are gay in your grade aren’t ready to come out yet and so you’re just stuck there with no options. I just really thought I finally found someone. And I was really excited to have found someone.”

“That makes complete sense. Talk to this boy. I’m sure he’ll have an explanation and it’ll work out. And I’m always here for you if you need me.” I raised my eyebrow at him.

“Okay this still doesn’t change the fact that you’re a complete stranger who no one knows the identity of wearing a mask pretending to be half-man half-spider.”

“Oh, how the tables have turned!” We both laughed. “Anyways, I should be swinging off. Friendly neighborhood spider-business and all.”

“Alright. Thanks for the chat. I’ll see you around?”

“Only if you get into even more trouble!” He jumped up onto the side of the building above us. He turned back one last time to say, “Also, Gus! You are _extremely_ cute and anyone who doesn’t see that is _extremely_ dumb. Good luck with this boy of yours but, just so you know, there’s more than just one fish in the sea that likes you.” I know he was wearing a mask but I swear he winked at me before swinging away. As if my life couldn’t get any more complicated in one night.


	6. Messy Monday

At school on Monday, I decided I needed to clear the air with Peter. But whenever I tried to approach him in the hallway, he awkwardly shuffled away. Even during Biology, which had become our class that we would always hang out during, he sat on the opposite side of the room. I decided I would have to make more of an effort to talk to him, so when the school bell rang at the end of the day I sprinted to the front entrance before anyone else got there and waited right outside. Before I knew it, Peter was rushing out of the doors before anyone else, unzipping his backpack frantically.

“Peter!” He nearly walked right into me and jumped back, startled.

“Oh! Hi Gus. What’s, uhh, what’s up?”

“I just wanted to chat about what happened on Friday.”

“Yeah, totally, I do too, I just really have to run right now.”

“Oh. Again?”

“Nonono it’s not like that. I’m really sorry about how I just ran out on you like that. That was totally uncool of me. I understand that it’s so hard to put yourself out there like you did and then nothing comes out of it and I know it’s so much harder to find someone being gay or just when you’re a guy looking for another guy but I seriously _have_ to go you don’t understand how much I wish we could just chat right now.” I paused for a moment. It was weird how well Peter understood me. It was like he knew exactly what I opened up about with Spider-Man on Friday. It still didn’t change the fact that he was being totally inconsiderate about how he treats other people, though.

“Oh, okay… I mean—“ I was cut off by a loud whirr above us. We both looked up and saw Iron Man shoot across the sky directly above our school, heading towards midtown.

“Gus I _have_ to go. I’m so sorry. We’ll talk later I promise.” Peter ran past me and before I knew it he was completely out of sight.

Later that night I decided that I should text Peter. “Hey I don’t know why you’ve been avoiding me so much ever since we were about to kiss but that really wasn’t that fun for me especially since then you’ve only avoided me. Can we please talk?”

After a few minutes he responded. “not gonna b at school 4 a bit really gtg maybe soon?”

I couldn’t believe it. He couldn’t even bring himself to type out a full sentence for me or even explain to me why he’s been acting so weird? Should I even trust him anymore?


	7. Misunderstandings

Peter wasn’t in school for the next two days. On Wednesday, as I was leaving school, I turned the corner on my way home and came face to face with Peter, who was standing in front of me. His face was badly bruised, with one large black eye on his left eye. He had a bad cut on his forehead and some bandages covering it. His left arm was in a sling and I could tell that he hurt his right leg since he was leaning heavily on his left leg and when he stepped towards me he had a limp.

“Peter, Jesus Christ what happened to you?”  
“Gus I’m so sorry. A lot has happened to me these past few days and I just need to explain myself. I know I’ve treated you like a piece of crap and no one deserves that, especially not you who has been nothing but kind and welcoming to me these first few weeks here. Doing that to you on Friday night was terrible and rude and it broke my heart to do it but I get really nervous around big explosions and deathly events like that. I don’t know if you know this or not but… my uncle died about a year ago. He was just shot coming home one night and ever since then I always get very paranoid around things like that.”

“Peter… I’m so sorry. I had no clue. That makes total sense and I’m so sorry you had to be in a situation like that. If anyone were faced with what you had to face they would have acted the same if not worse and I’m so surprised you were able to handle it how you did. I’m really proud of you.”

“It’s okay. Really it is. Still, it doesn’t change the fact that I hurt you, and I can’t even express how guilty I feel.”

“I mean, it did hurt a lot how you dealt with that and even all weekend you wouldn’t even shoot me a text or anything saying you were sorry and you could explain later.”

“I know and you’re right. And that was totally on me. And it was so unfair of me to not even give you a chance to figure things out on Friday.”

“The thing is, I’m really into you Peter, and I put myself out there for you on Friday. I was so excited to think that someone might actually be interested in me. It’s like you said on Monday, actually exactly like you said, it’s so hard being gay and being into other guys when they _never_ like you back. And this whole Spider-Boy stuff that’s been going on has _killed_ me because it’s given me this idea that I’m actually worth someone like Spider-Man. That an internationally known superhero would ever be interested in me. And even saying those words out loud sounds ridiculous cause I know I’m making things up and that it can’t be true cause if no one has ever showed any interest in me up to this point why would Spider-Man? So I got this false sense of confidence knowing that maybe Spider-Man might like me and you might like me too. But when you abandoned me like that it brought that whole idea crashing down and made me feel terrible about myself. And how you acted Monday really just cemented that in.”

“I know. And, Gus, I _do_ like you. I really do.” I looked up at him. His large, brown, dreamy eyes were staring directly into mine. “I love how funny you are. And how kind you are. Seriously, you were the only person that actually reached out to me and talked to me here and that means more than you could know. And personality’s great and all…” I laughed, “But you’re also really _really_ cute. Like _extremely_ attractive.” I blushed, and looked away, hiding my smile. “Seriously, Gus. You deserve someone like Spider-Man, not just dumb ol’ me. And I’m sure Spider-Man does like you back, I mean who wouldn’t?” I looked up at him and we shared a moment as our eyes locked. “I am really sorry about what happened on Friday and Monday.”

“Where _did_ you have to go on Monday anyways?”

“I really had to go on Monday after school because…” I raised my eyebrows at him as he paused for a suspiciously long time, “Because I had to go to a retreat for my internship.”

“Internship?”

“Yeah, with, uh… Tony Stark.”

“You’re Tony Stark’s _intern???_ ”

“Well not exactly! I’ve met him a few times but mostly it’s all just about being a responsible young individual and all of that high school intern stuff. But they’re really strict about being on time places so I had to run after school Monday and didn’t really have the time to explain.”

“What do they make you do at Tony Stark’s internship? Get used as target practice?” I gestured to the various injuries across his whole body.

“Oh, this? This is, uhh… it’s nothing.”

“Nothing? You look like someone dropped a building on you.”

“Well that isn’t too far from the truth.”

“What?”

“Nothing. Just a joke. Sorry. I was mugged. Yesterday. On my way home from the internship. I decided to just take another day off of school to recover a bit. But I should be fine soon I’ve always healed pretty quick.”

“Are you okay? Is there anything I can do to help?” Peter looked down, upset at himself and the situation.

“No, it’s not that… I’m just really sorry, Gus.”

“I know you are. And I understand. Sort of. Still don’t get why you had to be _that_ cruel to me but I understand.” I looked at him and smiled. He smiled back. “I’m really sorry about your uncle. If I had any clue—“

“No. Don’t do that. It’s not your fault. There was no way you could have known. But thank you. It does mean a lot.”

“Do you wanna try this again? Maybe grab some coffee right now?”

“I would love to, I really would.”

“Oh god I sense another ‘but’ coming.”

“ _But_ I have this sort of debriefing thing. For the Stark Internship. Today and tomorrow.”

“Wow they really take themselves seriously over at Stark Industries.”

“Yeah, I guess they do.” He chuckled. “I’ll talk to you soon, okay? And let’s grab some breakfast on Saturday, how about that?”

“I’d like that a lot.”

“See you then, okay?”

“Perfecto.” We smiled at each other, small at first but it grew into two giant grins spreading over both of our faces. It divulged into uncontrollable laughter when I tried to go in for a hug without crushing his arm and sort of just ended up clinging onto his side like a koala. We waved goodbye and parted ways. It felt good knowing that, after all, maybe I did have some form of a chance with someone. I mean, Peter was no Spider-Man, but he worked for Tony Stark so that’s _something_ , right?


	8. All Webbed Up

The walk home on Friday started off as uneventful. I stopped by a deli to grab a banana as a snack pre-Friday night pizza and _Drag Race_ with Kitty. Strangely, while I was leaving the store, I heard a flock of birds flutter into the air from the roof above me and, when I looked up, I thought I saw a red blur streak through the air. I decided to ignore it and kept on my way home, but I couldn’t help but feel like someone was watching me. Suddenly, as I was crossing the street with my headphones in and music blazing, I felt a cold sweat cover my body as I saw the person crossing the street next to me sprint to the sidewalk. I looked up just in time to see a U-Haul truck careening through the red light directly towards me. I closed my eyes and braced for impact, taking in the thought that this could be my last moment on this Earth. When I opened my eyes, I found myself facing directly into a black spider symbol on the center of a red spandex costume’s chest. I looked up and saw the familiar face of Spider-Man, once again holding tightly onto me as we swung through the air together. I looked down and saw the out-of-control truck caught in a gigantic web that spanned the entire intersection. No one else seemed to be hurt. I wrapped my arms around Spider-Man’s torso, feeling his muscles shift underneath his costume as he used his core and arm strength to swing us through the air without a hitch. Eventually, we softly landed on a web hammock strung between two buildings on the very West side of Manhattan, looking out over the Hudson River. Spider-Man set me down on the center of the hammock and sat across from me, awkwardly cross-legged.

“You know you could have set me down on the street, it probably would have been easier for me to get home and all.”

“Oh my god I’m so sorry I just thought— It doesn’t matter here let me—“

“No it’s fine! Don’t worry about it.” Spider-Man awkwardly shifted between seating positions before deciding on a too-cool-for school pose with one leg stretched out and the other bent so that his arm could rest on it. I could tell he was trying to look good for me. “So, uhhhh, Spider-Boy huh?” I said to break the awkward silence.

“You know it took me _ages_ to get rid of that nickname I’m glad it’s now stuck with somebody else. Or not glad I guess, since now you have to deal with it, you know what I mean? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for this…” He trailed off and once again readjusted how he was sitting so his legs dangled off of the hammock above the street forty stories below us. “This was probably out of line. I just thought we could chat some more after the last two times. This time maybe without the news cameras filming us or you in an oddly depressed mood for having you life just saved?” He looked towards me. Even through the mask I could tell he was embarrassed.

“Yeah, I would like that.” I smiled at him. The white eyes of his suit grew wide, then he quickly looked away from me and scratched the back of his head. “I don’t mind being called Spider-Boy, you know. It’s kinda fun to think of myself as your, I don’t know, your boy? If that makes sense.”

“Really?”

“I mean you’re _Spider-Man_ who wouldn’t want to be a superhero’s ‘boy’? Anyways everyone at school thinks that I hooked up with Spider-Man in a web cocoon now so that has its plusses.”

“So that would be a plus for you?”

“Are you kidding?? I mean have you looked at yourself in the mirror recently you have like the hottest abs ever made. Literally it’s like a Greek God sculpted them or something. Or I guess Norse God since those are the ones that are actually real and all.”

“Oh don’t even compare me to Thor nothing can beat _his_ abs.”

“Haha very true.” The silence grew longer again. I crawled across the hammock closer to him. I reached my hand out for his thigh and was going to gently place my hand there, but I had a better idea. Riskier, but better. I pushed away from the hammock and sent myself plummeting to the ground. Before I knew it Spider-Man’s toned arms were wrapped tightly around me and I could even feel his legs squeezing our pelvises together so we became one falling object. Our fall gently slowed down as the web line he shot above us stretched to its limit. With a few more ‘thwips’ of his web shooter, he built me a small swing to sit upright on so the blood wouldn’t all rush to my head, while he stayed hanging upside down in front of me.

“Okay I’m happy to save you from danger that’s not your fault but you can’t just go jumping off of buildings to get my attention.”

“I didn’t do it for your attention. I did it so that I could feel your arms wrapped around me, dummy.” His eyes widened again and he looked off to the side. I couldn’t be sure, but I think his suit eyes widened whenever he blushed. “Speaking of saving me from danger how did you know that truck was going to hit me earlier today?”

“I was just, you know, in the neighborhood.”

“You were not! You were following me weren’t you? That’s what I saw when I was leaving the deli earlier you were waiting for me outside! And when I was with Kitty the other night! Wow what a creep.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t mean to be creepy I was just—“

“It’s okay,” I interrupted him, “I glad we got to spend this time together.” I reached out and cupped his masked cheek in my hand. He placed his own free hand that wasn’t holding onto his web line on top of mine, giving it a light squeeze. I reached my other hand out and found the edge of his costume between his mask and his suit and pulled down so it would just uncover his mouth. I reached the same hand to the back of his head and swung him a little bit closer to my head, but I couldn’t quite reach his lips from where he was. It was more like me kissing his forehead. I heard his webline unspurl from his web shooter as he unclenched his hand, sending him dropping multiple feet towards the ground, leaving me face first with his crotch.

“THAT IS NOT WHAT I MEANT TO DO OHMIGOD I’M SO SORRY!” His legs quickly crawled up the webline so that his lips were in line with my mine. “I’m serious it’s bad enough that I was stalking you please don’t think I just tried to shove your face into my crotch this is all I wanted to do.”

“Shut up already.” I pulled his head into mine and our lips touched. His lips were thin but soft. We gently placed them together, giving each other a light peck, before going in for another peck, then another, then another. Gradually, our mouths got wider and wider with each peck and before I knew it we were furiously making out 40 stories above the busy streets of New York City. He pulled away for a second to try to say something in between kisses.

“You know,” Kiss, “This really,” Kiss, “Isn’t a good idea,” Kiss, “For me to make out,” Kiss, “With someone,” Kiss, “That looks like you,” Kiss, “While wearing,” Kiss, “Skin-tight spandex,” Kiss. I pulled away from him to look up at where my face was inches away from minutes earlier.

“Oh my god, wow, that’s um…”

“Oh yeah this is a really bad idea let me just.” With another ‘thwip thwip’ of his web shooters he was in a swing opposite me, his hands placed conveniently over his crotch. We both looked at each other then burst out laughing.

“Just cause you got a boner doesn’t mean we should stop, if anything I kinda wanna keep going.” His eyes grew wider than I had ever seen him before and he looked down at his hands, making sure everything was staying covered. The sun was setting behind me over the Hudson River. “I actually should really be getting home, considering I have homework and everything I wanna get done before the weekend.”

“Psshhh I’m a crime fighting vigilante homework is literally the last thing I think about on any given day.”

“Wait so you’re in high school too?”

“Crap! No you shouldn’t know that! Um I could be in college, though, they have homework, and, uh, stuff…” I raised one eyebrow at him. “Okay fine I’m in high school but that’s all you’re getting from me.”

“I feel like that’s a little unfair considering I just gave you a boner in your costume and literally the whole world knows me as Spider-Boy now, but fine. Can you swing me home though?”

“Sure, let me just, um,” He looked down at his hands again. “I’m just gonna swing around the block until this all goes away it should only be a minute.”

“Swinging better be all you’re doing to make it go away or else I’d feel left out.” His eyes grew wide again.

“You have _got_ to stop saying flirty things like that while I have a boner in a spandex costume!”

“Fiiiiine.”

The rest of the evening went by pretty quickly with him swinging me back home and dropping me out front my apartment building. He gave me a little nod goodbye and we shared a chuckle as he checked his crotch one last time before swinging into the busy city to make sure everything was hidden.

“When will I get to see you next?” I asked him.

“Not sure. Have any weekend plans?”

In one large rush it all came rushing back to me. Peter. The flirting. The almost-kiss. The asshole move on his part. The making up. The laughter. The happiness. The plans to get breakfast tomorrow. Me wanting so bad to be with him. To be with Peter. Peter.

“Oh my god what did I just do?”

“What?” Spider-Man asked.

“It’s like I completely forgot anyone else existed for a second. You just, like, took me into another world.”

“What are you talking about? Is everything okay?”

“No everything is not okay! That boy from Friday we made up and I like him a lot and we’re gonna get breakfast tomorrow.”

“Well, that’s fine… I’m sure—“

“No it is not fine! I like him! Him! Peter Parker! A _real_ person! Not some costumed creep that stalks me and flirts with me and makes me want to kiss him and saves my life. I have a _real life_ thing going on and I can’t just do whatever I want and not think about other people’s wants in life. That’s exactly what I was mad at Peter for! I’m sorry, it’s nor your fault, I just can’t ever do anything like this again. Oh god, what am I going to do with Peter?”

“I’m sure he doesn’t care.” I paused and looked at him for a moment. Was he being serious? “Just don’t tell him it’s not that big of a deal at all just let yourself forget it ever happened and, I don’t know, use this as a confidence boost or something.”

“Are you _kidding_ me? You’re such an asshole! I can’t believe you! You want me to just enjoy making out with you this one time and use it as a ‘confidence boost’? You’re ridiculous. You don’t think about anyone else, not how weird this is for me, or how terrible this is for Peter, or anything.”

“No, I do care, it’s not like—“

“Just go, seriously. I don’t want to talk to you or see your dumb costumed face ever again. And stop following me. I could finally give the police a real reason to arrest you after all these years. You could go join Cap and all of his fugitive friends except you weren’t fighting for democracy you were stalking a teenage boy.”

“…”

“Go.”

Spider-Man swung away. I felt sick. I felt like I just cheated on Peter, even though we never officially became a thing. But Peter was real, this was all a fantasy. How could Peter trust someone that trusts total strangers to save them from death and kiss them upside down? I guess I’d find out on Saturday.


	9. Facing Fears

When Saturday breakfast came around, I knew I had to talk to Peter and tell him what happened. I know we never officially said that we were “dating” or anything but I still feel like there was an understanding between us that we were gonna try out things, and kissing other people sort of goes against that. In any case, whether or not Peter cared that I kissed someone else, he would be pretty freaked out that it I thought it was okay to kiss someone whose real identity I didn’t even know.

I met Peter in this little café on the Upper West Side that I loved. He was a bit reluctant and said that deli egg sandwiches in the park were more his style but went along with it for my sake. As if I couldn’t feel guilty enough by then. I got to the restaurant first to grab us a table and also because I couldn’t stand holding in the secret any longer. By the time Peter showed up, my palms were already drenched in sweat.

“Hey, Gus!” Peter awkwardly waved to me from the front of the restaurant and sat across the table. He seemed a bit nervous too, but what did he have to be scared about? We exchanged pleasantries and sat in silence pretending that we were both just very invested in the menu in front of us. Eventually I couldn’t hold it in any longer.

“Okay I have to tell you something.”

“Hm?” Peter looked up, startled by my sudden need to talk, but he didn’t seem entirely surprised.

“Okay… so… the other day after we hung out…” It was hard to go past that. It just seemed so insane what happened. I started thinking of other things I could say that happened instead of the truth. I expected Peter to be asking me what happened but he didn’t until I looked at him nervously.

“Uh, yeah, what happened?” I took a deep breath.

“So I ran into Spider-Man and long story short he kissed me. Well, that’s not true. That’s not fair. I kissed him. We kinda like made out hanging off a building. And he was upside down. And for a second I just forgot all about you and everything that was happening between us but then it all just came flooding back and I told him to leave and he tried to say that you wouldn’t care and he was just an asshole so I just told him to never bother me again. But I’m really sorry. It’s ridiculous because you’re actually a real person in front of me that I know and is sweet and funny and cute and I want a relationship with you not a masked vigilante. And I’m sorry. I really am. And you don’t have to worry about that or me kissing random strangers ever again. And I know me freaking out so much about it is a little weird since we’re not actually a couple or anything I just felt guilty about it. So I’m sorry, again.” I kept my head down. I couldn’t bear to look up at him. Then I felt a warm yet rough and worn hand cover both of mine. I looked up at Peter. Once again those big brown eyes of him stared directly at me and melted my heart. He gave me an encouraging squeeze.

“Gus, it’s okay.” A wave of relief washed over my body. “It’s fine, I don’t really care. Just forget about it. It never really even happened. We can just go on with us now and focus on that.” Something didn’t sit right.

“What do you mean?”

“What do you mean ‘what do you mean?’?”

“That’s it? Just move on and forget it ever happened? You’re not upset or weirded out at all?”

“I mean, yeah. I just wanna focus on us now.” He squeezed my hands again and smiled. I pulled them away.

“You can’t just do that.”

“What?”

“You can’t just forget the past and say ‘oh let’s focus on the present and our future’. Shit that people do in the past can’t just be forgiven and forgotten instantly that’s not how you can do things. At least that’s not how I think they should happen.”

“But you didn’t do any ‘shit’ that’s that bad, Gus. Seriously, it’s fine. Stop beating yourself up.”

“This isn’t about me beating myself up and blaming myself! This is about how you’re dealing with this situation!”

“ _What?_ ”

“Yeah, I thought you’d be more upset about all of this!”

“You _want_ me to be more upset? Isn’t my reaction like the best possible outcome for you?”

“It is! But sometimes life can’t just be the best possible outcome! It’s not like I want you to be mad at me it’s just that I want you to be someone that would be mad at me for doing something like this. Because I want to be with someone that has morals and ideas about this and doesn’t think that kissing random strangers while you’re involved with other people is okay.”

“But we were never involved. We aren’t involved! Yet! I want to be involved! And I do have morals about this kind of thing! It’s just that Spider-Man isn’t a stranger he’s…” Peter hesitated, “he’s… Spider-Man.” He seemed disappointed to be saying that. 

“But you literally don’t have morals Peter! You just completely forgave me without even asking me to further explain myself or anything! And you think that _Spider-Man_ isn’t a stranger when he’s literally a stranger in a mask.”

“What— But— You explained everything earlier I had no more questions!”

“Are you _kidding_ me? I know how insane this sounds I’m the one that kisses someone else and now I’m mad, but it’s just that first you act weird last weekend and then now this rolls around and you don’t even blink twice when I tell you that I kissed someone else at the very start of our relationship. It’s like if you forgive me for things like this it feels like you’re going to expect me to forgive you if you go off and kiss someone else later in our relationship and I’m not okay with that. I want to face the repercussions for what I did now because I don’t think either of us should be cheating on each other.”

“I agree! I really—“

“You don’t though, Peter. You’re just contradicting yourself now.”

“Gus, I wish I could explain.”

“Explain _what_?”

“That— I don’t know.”

“You can never fully explain things, Peter. I really wish this could work between us but I just don’t know anymore.”

“Yeah…” He hung his head low.

“It’s not your fault. Don’t blame yourself for anything. It’s just… It’s clear that we don’t work paired up. Our lives just don’t, I don’t know, click.”

“Yeah…” I got up out of my chair.

“I really wish it could click, though. Maybe we should just give it some more time?”

“Yeah, maybe…”

“See ya around, Peter.”


	10. An Electric Shock

“I’m sorry Gus, that sucks.” Kitty and I were hanging out after school on Monday. I was finally filling her in on everything that had happened on Saturday. “Have you talked to him since?”

“I mean, I saw him in school today and now we’re sort of forced to sit in our usual spots during Bio together, but we just quietly worked next to each other. It’s just so strange. I kept on getting this feeling that all of Saturday he wanted to tell me something to defend himself, but he just wouldn’t. And I don’t know if that’s cause he knew I didn’t want to hear any more of his B.S. excuses or what, but I just feel like the situation is somehow unresolved.”

“That makes total sense, regardless of whether or not he still has more to say. You guys had feelings for one another that developed so quickly and then were forced to end even more quickly.”

“I mean, I’m mad at him but I do still have feelings for him. It’s not like I just lost all feelings for him after, like, a day. And the worst part is he’s still _so_ cute.” Kitty laughed. “I’m _serious_. Like I don’t _want_ to still like him, but he just strolls down the hallway looking like the cutest little dork I’ve ever seen and I _still_ wish we kissed that night and that he didn’t lie to me and that we could have worked out. So, yeah, I do still like him. I’m just mad. And I don’t think things could ever work between us with that anger in there.”

“Yeah, that makes sense. This last week has been _insane_ for you. I’m glad we get to spend this time together now though and just hang out together.” I gave her a little side hug as we walked through Washington Square Park together.

“Yeah, it’s really nice. How’s Harry doing?”

“Oh my god, Harry’s doing amazingly. His gig a few weeks ago has stirred up a ton of publicity for him in the indie-pop-rock scene. We’re just so happy together. He really gets me and we’ve grown so close but at the same time it’s like every day w’re just talking and meeting for the first time and it’s so flirtatious and fun.”

“Yeah okay I think that hearing about how you and your boyfriend are doing isn’t the _best_ idea after completely shattering my entire relationship with my crush.” We both laughed.

“Awww, I’m sorry, Gus. Let’s do something fun. What if we went—“

CRASH. Kitty and I stopped dead in our tracks and looked behind us from where the loud, booming sound came. At this point I should have just started expecting loud destructive noises to interrupt any conversation I was having. A familiar human-resembling lightning bolt just erupted from the street behind us.

“Are you kidding me? _This_ one _again_??” I exclaimed.

“No way! Is that the same one that attacked us when we were eating pizza?”

“Mmhm. And the same one that you-know-who saved me from. It’s this guy’s fault that I now have a vigilante stalking me. I swear if he shows up to save the day again I’m gonna—“ Just then a familiar ‘thwip’ and ‘woosh’ sound happened right above us. I looked up towards the sky, dreading what I knew I would see. A red-and-blue-clad young superhero in spider-themed spandex swung into the park and perched himself on a branch of a tree.

“Hey, sparky! I thought the last time I saw you, you were a lot more wet.”

“Exactly who I was looking for,” his metallic voice ringed in my ears after Electro spoke those words. “You thought water could stop me? It just took a little bit of time for all my electric particles that were exploded apart and scattered across the atmosphere to join up again and form a full and complete… me!”

“No but seriously back to you being all lightning-y and not soaking wet, what kind of hairdryer are you using? This is some next-level tech, you should get it patented. You could be a millionaire!”

Kitty chuckled as we hid underneath a tree on the edge of the park. I gave her a death stare.

“Sorry, sorry. I know he’s an asshole and a creep but he’s a pretty damn funny asshole and creep.” I rolled my eyes.

Spider-Man and Electro went into head-to-head combat above the park. It was almost like a well-choreographed dance. Electro shot a lightning bolt at Spidey and he leaped from his tree and gracefully landed in a one-handed handstand on top of the fountain in the center of the park. He swung himself around and perched himself there. With each bolt of pure electricity shot at Spidey, he gracefully hurled himself off of the fountain, quickly pulling himself back using a webline just as he got too far. He was smart. He was using the water from the fountain as a sort of a shield from Electro, preventing him from getting too close.

“You think that alone can stop me? Wow, you may be clever when it comes to quips, Spider, but not when it comes to fighting.” Electro tore into the ground, the ground vibrating and splitting as the mass of pure energy burrowed itself into it. Electro grabbed two thick power lines from below the ground and slashed them in half. The water in the fountain puttered out, leaving Spider-Man completely vulnerable.

“Oh sh—“ Electro made an A-line directly at Spider-Man, giving Spidey no time to react. He was launched across the part, left in a heap surrounded by dug-up dirt next to a newsstand. The park was practically empty except for us now.

“Gus, maybe we should run. It doesn’t seem to be going too well.”

Electro was hitting Spider-Man with an onslaught of never-ending lightning bolts. The explosions from their battle alone were brighter than the sun above us. Kitty and I squinted our eyes and turned away.

“You may have shut down that fountain…” Spider-Man was struggling to get words out, “But nothing’s better than some good ol’ fashioned… bottled water!” Spider-Man shot a web line out, latching it onto the side of a cooler in the newsstand containing bottles upon bottles of Poland Spring water bottles. He used all of his remaining strength to swing it around and directly into Electro’s side. Electro was knocked off of Spidey, giving Spidey enough time to swing away towards us and regain strength. Electro was mildly short-circuiting from the water but he seemed used to it by now. It only took him a few seconds to burn away all of the water and regain full composure. Spider-Man still had a better chance now to take Electro down now that he got out from under him. That was the case, at least, until he spotted me watching the battle. He immediately swung towards me.

“Gus, what are you doing here?! Get out of here fast! I don’t want anything to happen to you!”

“Oh my _god_ can’t you just leave me be for one second? I’ll be fine I don’t need your help!”

“No, I have to get both of you out of here right away.” He stepped towards us and placed his hand on my arm, gently pushing Kitty and I closer together so he could web us together and swing us off.

“Get OFF of me creep!” I shoved him away from us. He stumbled back. His costume eyes widened, but I could tell this time it was out of shock. “Just focus on—“

I was cut off by a lightning bolt racing past my faces, just inches away. It was massive and blew Spider-Man across and out of the park and into the side of a building on the other side of the street.

“SPIDEY!” I called out. Kitty hugged me close.

“Gus, we should really really go.” I could tell she was terrified. Before at least Spider-Man was there to stop Electro but now, nothing was stopping Electro from getting to us. We both started running towards the edge of the park, leaping over bushes and hurling ourselves around trees in our path. This was a life-or-death scenario. I heard Kitty shout out from behind me.

“Gus! Wait!” Her foot got caught on a fallen branch and she fell to the ground. Electro heard her from the other end of the park and was standing directly above her in less than a second.

“Well, well, well. Our good friend Spider-Man seemed to care enough about you two to forget I was still here so maybe hurting you might be the perfect blow to his ego.” His metallic voice said. A long, menacing string of pure electricity extended from his arm as he hovered above the ground and he slowly raised it, in preparation to whip it down onto Kitty.

“NO! KITTY!” A flash of light and a loud stinging sound enveloped me. I curled up into a ball as the dust settled around me and the ringing in my ears blocked all sounds around me. There was an unsettling smell of something burnt in the air.

That couldn’t be it. Kitty couldn’t have just died right then. It was all my fault. If I hadn’t kissed Spider-Man he wouldn’t have become obsessed with me. He wouldn’t have tried to protect me during that fight, and Electro wouldn’t have thought that Spider-Man cared about Kitty too. I felt sick to my stomach. How could this be real? All the times together, gone. All of the memories couldn’t be built upon anymore. That was it. Kitty was gone.

I looked up fearfully, expecting to see Kitty’s burned body in front of me. Instead, I saw Iron Man in full battle against Electro. The spot where Kitty was was demolished entirely, leaving burned wood and grass surrounding it. I looked up into the air to see War Machine holding Kitty safely in his arms. She was sobbing out of fear, but alive. Kitty was alive. I felt relief wash over my body. Then a sense of dread. Spider-Man, as creepy as he was, put his life on the line for me and was instead met head-on with a lightning bolt. I saw where he was crumpled against a building across the street. I ran out of the park and towards him. His body was crumpled in a heap against the wall of a building, a large dent left in the concrete above him from the force of his body slamming against the wall.

“Spider-Man?” I prodded his motionless body with my shoe. “Are you okay?” I kneeled down and grabbed his shoulder and flipped him over. He was a lot heavier than he seemed. His body turned over and removed itself from the wall so that he was lying flat on the sidewalk. I looked him over. There was a gash in his left leg that tore through his suit and was leaving blood pouring out of him. The torso of his suit was also shredded apart by the blast. I was face-to-muscle with the familiar set of abs I saw the first time I met him. For some reason, however, it seemed like I had encountered them a lot more recently. I followed the torn-up suit to his mask, where the tear continued, exposing the entire right side of his face. And that’s when I saw it. Who he was. Who had been stalking me, annoying me, and making my life so much harder recently. Who had kissed me and manipulated me. Who refused to reveal his identity to me. Who made me fall for him. Who treated me poorly but made me feel like the happiest boy in the world. Who, no matter how mad I told myself I was at them, I knew deep down I still had feelings for them. This description matched one person and one person alone. Peter Parker and Spider-Man. Because Peter Parker _was_ Spider-Man.


	11. A Rude Awakening

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Peter's POV!!!!!!!!!!!

My eyes fluttered open briefly then immediately shut again. My head was ringing and I could only hear muffled blasts and explosions in the distance. My whole body was in intense pain, but my leg in particular felt as if it was being torn in half. I gently reached out towards it with my left hand, withdrawing it from the wound immediately after feeling pain the second I touched the gash in my leg. Yep. It’s literally almost torn in half. I forced my eyes open this time around and saw a blurry out-of-focus figure looming above me. I squinted, trying to adjust to the daylight, but it barely helped. I hit the side of my head firmly a few times. It felt like I was rebooting an old computer, but at this point I had found out that my superpowered body acted a bit more machine than regular human at times. I rubbed the dust and dirt out of my eyes as I shut them tightly, hoping that that would clear them out a bit. When I brought my hands to my face to do so, however, my spandex-covered fingers only met with a similar spandex feel when touching the left side of my face. My right hand was touching skin. My skin. My unmasked skin. I patted around my eye frantically. My mask had been torn off on the right side of my face. I was exposed. I opened my eyes immediately, hoping that I had only imagined someone standing directly in front of me. Unfortunately this wasn’t the case. The large figure slowly came into focus. They were kneeling beside me. He was kneeling beside me. I could tell it was a boy. I looked into his eyes. Familiar eyes. Hazel. The hazel eyes of the boy that I have had the biggest crush on the past weeks. The eyes of Gus Myers. Both of my eyes widened as I crawled back away from him quickly.

“Gus! What are you— You can’t— This—“

“Peter, I…” He kneeled there staring at me, dumbstruck. I didn’t know who was more surprised. I quickly shot a web straight at my face, covering the side of my mask that was previously uncovered.

“Karen, reboot all systems.” I said into my suit.

“What? Who’s Karen? Peter, can you just take a moment to—“

“Hello, Peter. What can I do for you today?” The voice inside my mask said to me.

“Uhhhh, who’s that?” Gus asked. Because the mask was torn open, the audio must have been able to leak out beyond range of my ears.

“Nice to meet you, Gus, my name is Karen. I’ve heard a _lot_ about you in the past few weeks. You are _one_ —“

“Alright, Karen, that’s enough!” I cut her off before she could reveal anything I told her during our late-night chat sessions.

“You’re right, Peter, he is very handsome, especially in person.”

“Karen!”

“Okay I am beyond confused, Peter, can you please just take a minute to explain _everything_?”

“Sorry it looks like he doesn’t have any time for that right now, buddy.” The voice of the one and only Tony Stark echoed around Gus and I from inside my suit.

“Mr. Stark? What are you doing here?” I asked nervously.

“Look to your left, kid.” I looked over to see Mr. Stark in his Iron Man armor successfully beating Electro down using a combination of shock-absorbing tech and water-based attacks. War Machine was floating above him, holding that girl that I always would see Gus hanging out with.

“Is that Tony Stark? In your _mask_?!” This was a lot for Gus to take in, I could tell.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. Even my voice is too charming to handle. Anyways, kid, I gotta ship you off to med evac that leg of yours won’t be getting better anytime soon by sitting on this bacteria-infested sidewalk.”

“But, Mr. Stark, what about Electro? He’s my responsibility I should be the one to—“

“Look, you don’t wanna be an Avenger? Fine. That’s your choice. But at least take the help when you need it. Anyways this Electro guy is about to be put into a permanent home made of pure non-conductive matter safe at the New Avengers Facility upstate and Rhodes is taking care of civilians and clean-up.”

“Will Kitty be okay?” Gus chirped out suddenly.

“Huh? Hey, Rhodes, how’s the screaming girl doing?”

James Rhodes’ voice joined our superpowered sidewalk conference call. “She’s, well, still screaming. But she’s gonna be fine – a long trip to a therapist should help her.” We could hear her faint shrill cry in the background of War Machine’s audio.

“Oh, thank god.” I saw a wave of relief wash over Gus’ body.

“Anyways, kid, this is your ride.”

“Wait, Mr. Stark, I still got some, uh…” I looked at Gus “… other matters to deal with here.”

“Yeah, I think saving your leg is more important than explaining things to your boyfriend. Or, not boyfriend, as of pretty recently. Or you two never really became boyfriends? I don’t know anymore this teen drama is exciting but so hard to keep up with.”

“How did you—“ I stammered.

“You know I have access to anything you say or do in that suit. Including talking to Karen. What can I say, I’m a snooper.”

“Hey!” I looked at Gus. He was clearly embarrassed. And hurt. And confused. And overwhelmed. And clearly needed a rest. “I promise you I can sort this all out.”

“No time for that now, lover boys, this is you.” Before I knew it another Iron Man armor swooped down and scooped me into its arms, carrying me directly into the sky and quickly out of the city.

“I’m guessing you’re really in London or something right now?”

“Hey, give me some more credit! Sure, I’m not carrying you back home right now but I’m back at the park sealing Electric Man up in a little tube easy-peasy.”

“Don’t make it sound so easy you’re making me feel bad.”

“Okay, he is a pretty tough villain to get down without the right tech but to be fair you _were_ pretty distracted with a certain boy.”

“Oh my god! I still can’t believe you’re snooping on Karen and I that’s so uncool.”

“Yeah, yeah. We’ll discuss later. I gotta run kid and scan the area for any additional bystanders that might need us but we’ll talk when I get home.” The line went silent on his end as I sat curled up into a ball in the cold metallic arms of the empty armor. It all came rushing back to me. Gus knew. He knew who I was. Who I really was. Oh, god. This is gonna be messy. Typical Parker luck.


	12. The Aftermath

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Peter's POV!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

“So… he should be out and about when exactly?”

“By tomorrow. His accelerated healing powers plus the _superb_ tech provided by yours truly is making this months-long recovery process just a matter of days. You can thank me with a date maybe?”

Aunt May was grilling Mr. Stark about my well-being after the Electro incident two days ago. Ever since she found out I was Spider-Man, she hasn’t been the biggest fan of my extracurricular activity. For the most part, I’ve stayed out of intensive care because of my accelerated healing factor but this is the worst shape I’ve ever been in and it’s obvious this is the worst mental state she’s been in too.

“Peter, I gotta run to work but I love you and I hope you get better soon.” She walked over to my bed and smothered me in kisses. I could see Mr. Stark stifling a laugh in the corner.

“Okay, okay, May, I’m fine.” I said, embarrassed and pushing her away from me. She ruffled my hair.

“Stay safe. And no swinging home. Let Tony jet you home or something.”

“Oh so we’re on a first name basis now?” Mr. Stark perked up.

“Shut it, or I will cut your balls off.”

“Oo, kinky.”

“Ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, _EW!_ I cannot be hearing this right now! Please, just leave May, before it gets worse.” I said as I hid under my covers and covered my ears. Aunt May left the room and I felt the bed lurch to one side as Tony sat next to me.

“Alright, kid, you’re safe to come out.” I poked my head out of the covers and was greeted by the perfectly lit hospital room that was nicer than my own home. That seemed to be the case about every single room in the New Avengers Facility. Mr. Stark noticed me admiring my surroundings. “You know I offered you a place here, you were the one that turned it down.”

“I have to say Mr. Stark, that’s the only thing that makes me regret not becoming an Avenger. That and, well, being an Avenger.”

“Well, that’s your fault. The offer still stands though.”

“Aha! Tried to get me again with your tests but failed.”

“Yep, totally. Just another test…” He looked off into the distance. “Anyways, kid, we gotta talk about your little unmasking incident earlier.” I buried my face into my hands.

“Please don’t remind me.”

“It’s okay. We’ll work it all out.” He patted my leg from above the blanket.

“It’s not just that, it’s—“

“I know. Teen love. Teen drama. All that stuff.” There was a pause. “Hey, I have no problem with it or anything but when did the whole… you know… liking boys thing happen? I mean, I thought you were all about Vulture’s daughter Liz from Midtown.” I glared at him.

“How do you know about Liz too?”

“This snooping thing isn’t a recent habit…”

“That is so uncool! You have to quit it with that my personal life should stay personal!”

“You’re right, you’re right. Here, from this day forward, I do solemnly swear never to hack into Karen to get all your juicy teen drama.” He extended his hand towards mind. I shook it begrudgingly.

“I still can’t believe we actually had to make you promise me not to stalk me.”

“Hey, don’t judge me for stalking! I see what you’re really doing in that Spider-Man suit now that you’ve met Gus!”

“That wasn’t—“ Tony glared at me. “It was just—“ His gaze intensified. “Okay, fine, I may have gone a bit far too.”

“Good. Now today we both learned an important lesson about using our powers _responsibly_ (that means not stalking your crush on his way home).”

“Fiiiiiiiiine.”

“But, um, what about the whole boy thing?” I didn’t answer him right away. “It’s fine if it’s not any of my business!”

“No, no, no. I want to talk to _someone_ about it. I haven’t really. Talked to anyone, I mean. About it.”

“So do you think you’re… gay?”

“No! Not that anything’s wrong with that, obviously, I mean I’m the one with the crush on a boy, just… I liked Liz. I did. I really liked her. I was attracted to her and everything. I just think I’m… also attracted to boys?”

“So, bisexual?”

“Yeah, I guess so.” I looked down at my hands fumbling with one another. Tony patted my leg, right on my injury.

“Watch out!” I jerked away and he jerked his hand away too.

“Oops! Gotta watch for that one!” We both chuckled. He rested his hand on my shoulder and gave it a squeeze.

“That’s great, kid. Seriously. It just means that you get to sleep with even more people!”

“Ew, gross.”

“Sorry, sorry. My old playboy days got back to me there for a second.” A moment of awkward silence. “Does anyone else know?”

“I mean, not Aunt May. Not any of my friends. And Gus knows I like boys at least but doesn’t know the full story, so, I think you’re it.”

“Well, thanks for opening up. It means a lot.”

“Can this please just stay between us? I don’t really want this spreading around.”

“Of course.” His phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out and looked at the notification on the screen. “Oh, this is for you.”

“Who is it?”

“Him right over there.” Tony pointed to the door where I saw Gus standing, looking at me. “Come on in, come on in. I know the whole Avengers setting can be overwhelming but you two just hang out in here.” Tony got up off the bed and pulled a chair out from against the wall closer to my bed. He gave Gus a pat on the back as he left the room, leaving Gus a little starstruck. As he left the room I could see him give me a thumbs up and mouthing “I’m leaving the door locked for you two” before he winked and left the room, closing and locking the door behind him. It took every will of being in my body not to exclaim at him randomly in front of Gus and make myself seem like a fool. Gus sat down in the chair next to my bed.

“I didn’t know whether to bring you flowers or something so I just… didn’t, really. I’m sorry.”

“No! Don’t be sorry. The thought was sweet.” We smiled halfheartedly at each other. We both sat there in silence for a few minutes. We had a lot to say, but didn’t know who should speak first. Finally he broke the silence.

“So… you’re Spider-Man?”

“Yeah.”

“So this whole time it was you. Both at school and around the city. You were the same person.”  
“Yeah.”

“Clearly you have a bit of a stalking me problem but did you somehow find out where I went to school and follow me there after that first time we met with Electro?”

“No, no, no. That was a total coincidence. I swear. That’s why I was so weird with you those first few days at school. I was scared you’d recognize my voice or something. But after that first time we met with me as Spider-Man I made sure Karen put a voice distorter on me whenever I was around you.”

“And Karen is that voice in your suit?”

“Yeah. Mr. Stark made her for me. She’s kinda like my J.A.R.V.I.S. only she hasn’t been turned into a robot superhero. Yet.” That made him chuckle.

“So that night with the party and the kiss and everything…”

“Yeah, it was all cause I had to go do my Spider-Man thing.”

“Oh.”

“I didn’t totally lie when I was explaining what happened that night, though! My uncle did die a bit ago and I am pretty shaken up about that. But not so shaken up with loud noises and explosions cause that’s kinda part of the job with all of this.” I gestured around me. “I mean, mostly I did lie. About that and about a lot of things this past week and I’m really sorry but I had to for the whole secret identity thing. But I guess that doesn’t matter so much now.”

“I understand. Mostly. I mean, you have to keep your identity a secret to protect your family and stuff, right? Isn’t that the whole deal with superheroes and their identities?”  
“Yeah, you pretty much got it down there.”

“So am I the only one that knows? Besides Tony Stark, obviously.”

“It’s him, my best friend Ned, the Vulture (unfortunately), my Aunt (honestly even more unfortunately), and now you, too.”

“Woah… so I’m like in the core group of people that know your deep dark secrets.” I laughed.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“Okay, so I’m going through every interaction we’ve ever had and honestly the you being Spider-Man excuse pretty much explains everything here, but what’s the deal with the whole following me and kissing me thing?”

“Okay! I do have an excuse! I swear! Sort of.” He cracked a smile as he looked up at me. God, he was so cute. I really hope he would understand. “I’ll just get out there and say it. The stalking was a lot. And I’m sorry. It was a combo of me having a crush on you and just having that ability to see what was going on in your life when I couldn’t be around to see it and I know that’s wrong and creepy and messed up. My big thing about having these powers is that I have to be responsible with them and that was a very low moral point for me. And I’m sorry.”

“As creeped out as I am, I found the address of my celeb crush’s apartment building when I was 14 because one of his friends posted a photo of the view from the window of his apartment so I understand the doing ridiculous things for intense crushes.”

“Hey! I never said I had an intense crush on you!” He looked at me and raised his eyebrows incredulously and teasingly. “Okay, fine, it was pretty intense. _Is_ pretty intense.” He blushed and looked down. “And as for the whole kiss thing, you told me that day all about your insecurity with someone liking out and how you thought that you never deserved someone like Spider-Man. So I wanted to prove to you that you did cause in my opinion you don’t deserve Spider-Man cause Spider-Man is me—”

“Don’t say that!”

“Shh! My turn to speak and explain!” Gus smiled. “But it’s the idea of Spider-Man you didn’t think you deserved so I wanted to prove to you that you deserved anyone you wanted. I also wanted to make up for completely ruining what would have been your first kiss that night at the party so I wanted to give you a first kiss to remember. And in hindsight that was so creepy and weird that a total stranger was your first kiss but it was sometimes hard to remember that you didn’t know me and Spider-Man were the same person and so it was easier for me to think that everything that happened wasn’t as creepy as it _definitely_ was.”

“I’m glad you’re acknowledging the creepy factor.” We both laughed. “So it’s not like you wanted to kiss me at all, you just wanted to give me a memorable first kiss?”

“Well, _obviously_ I wanted to kiss you but if I led with ‘I was annoyed we didn’t get to kiss so I put on a Spider-Man costume and kissed you instead’ the creep factor would increase tenfold.”

“Very true.” Gus said, between laughs. Silence engulfed us again. I felt like I could say more. I knew I didn’t act like the best person these past few weeks to Gus and I knew that he didn’t deserve this. But I didn’t know how else to explain it. I was Spider-Man and to protect the people in my life somehow my life as Peter Parker had to take a hit. And, in this case, Peter Parker’s relationship with Gus did too. “And you just being missing from school at the beginning of last week was that all just…”

“Superhero stuff. Mr. Stark needed me when War Machine had to step out and someone hacked an old Ultron bot over in Europe and bang bang, crash crash, I missed a few days of school and left with a bruise or two.”

“Okay.” Silence. “I understand.” His words cut through the silence. I looked up at him. He was staring directly at me. My heart melted when he did that.

“You don’t have to say that.”

“But I do. I mean it’s… in _sane_ but… it makes sense.” He reached his hand out and squeezed mine.

“Thanks. For understanding. You really don’t have to but… it means a lot.”

“Of course.” I intertwined my fingers with his and we sat there for a while just holding hands. Studying each other’s hands with our own. There was a physical wall broken down between us. Even after the kissing and everything. We now knew each other, truly.

“Maybe now our lives could click, maybe?”

“Hm?” I looked up, startled after being engrossed in the moment.

“What I said before, at the café. I said that our lives couldn’t click because of everything that had happened, but now there’s no more barriers between us. It doesn’t mean we still won’t have to figure things out, but we can still try again now, maybe? Only if you would want to, of course.” I squeezed his hand tighter.

“Owowowow watch out!” Gus said as he tugged his hand away.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry! I sometimes forget about the whole spider power thing.”

“It’s okay.” Gus was smiling at me, but still holding his hand that was just squeezed a bit too much. I took his hurt hand in my hands and brought them up to my lips. I kissed them gently, being sure not to overuse my spider strength this time.

“I would love to try again, by the way.” I looked up after saying that to see Gus grinning ear to ear across from me. I burrowed my lips in his palm, kissing it over and over.

“I would, too.” Gus stood up out of his chair and sat down next to me on my bed. He lifted his legs onto the bed next to mine and lied down beside me. I turned to my side so we were lying in the bed face-to-face. I placed my hand on his lower back and pulled his torso close to mine.

“Would you want to try that whole kiss thing over, no super villain needing my attention or mask on this time?” Before I knew it Gus’ lips were on mine. They were just as soft and puffy as I remembered them being. His hand rubbed up my back from my waist into my hair, and then found its resting place gently tugging on my earlobe. I placed my hand on his waist and pulled it close to mine.

“It’s a lot better when I know who the person I’m kissing is.” He said as I smiled. I rested my forehead on his and looked directly into my eyes, giving him a small peck before saying,

“It’s a lot better when I’m not having all of the blood in my body rushing to my head.” Gus laughed and pulled me close into a hug.

“Thank you for telling me all of this,” He said into my ear.

“I mean it wasn’t _exactly_ my choice.”

“Yeah but I wouldn’t be surprised if you somehow got Tony Stark to mind wipe me or something.”

“Honestly, a fair assumption at this point.” I rolled to my other side and let Gus wrap his arms around me from behind, holding me and keeping me warm in his arms. He gently kissed my neck from behind. I looked out onto the canopy of trees of Upstate New York outside the window. In the far distance I could see the Manhattan skyline. This was good. This was happy. This would be the start of something right.


	13. Facing the Facts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back to Gus' POV!!!!!!!!!!!

Right after school on Friday there was a car waiting outside school to bring me to him, just like Peter said there would be. ‘Perks of having the richest man in the world being your mentor’ Peter texted me as I climbed into the decked-out town car. There was an array of snacks and beverages for me to choose from, as well as a flat-screen TV bigger than what I had at home. Additionally, Tony Stark was sitting in the passenger cabin across from me.

“Glad you could join me. Shut the door will ya? I don’t want any hormonal high schoolers taking over my car.” I stared at him, wide-eyed, as I shut the door behind me and took a seat. The car gently hummed as we began moving, but I could barely tell anything was happening.

“Nice, isn’t it? I just implemented some of my armor’s stabilizing tech into a car design and now you can drive around and barely notice it. Anyways, I didn’t come pick you up in person just to brag about my superior intellect. We gotta have a chat.” He grabbed a glass and inserted it into a cupholder in the side of the door. Seamlessly, a nozzle emerged from out of the door and poured water into the cup. “Here, have some water. This, once again, is probably a lot for you.”

I sat across from him speechless, and silently took the water glass from his hand. I chugged the whole glass in one sitting, not knowing what else to do.

“Woah, thirsty. Here, let me get another glass for you.” He filled it up with the same magical nozzle and handed it back to me. I decided to drink at a normal pace this time. “So Peter tells me things are good between you two now, is that right?”

“Yeah, I’d say so.” I looked down and smiled, thinking about all of the FaceTimes and late-night texting sessions we’d had since the last time we saw each other.

“Okay, good. At least you’re on our side.” I looked at him, confused. “Cause of the whole identity thing, we gotta make sure we don’t let any more super villains find out this kid’s identity.”

“I promise I would never let anyone know. Really, I promise. I totally understand the risks on his end and I can’t—“

“It’s not his end I’m worried about.”

“What?” Tony let out a deep breath in response.

“Look, I’m not trying to scare you away from him or anything I want him to be as happy as possible and you do do that for him.” I blushed. “But being… involved… with a superhero is dangerous business.” A pit in my stomach formed. “The big reason the identity thing is so important is that they want to protect the people they love. Supervillains, the big ones at least, don’t care about hurting their arch-nemesis physically they want to get where that hurts, and that means hurting the ones that they love. I can’t tell you how many times Pepper has been put in danger because of my work and you’re just _so_ young I… I can’t even imagine…” Tony trailed off. “Look, I already have his life on my hands and to think of you getting hurt when you can’t even defend yourself against the kind of people we’re working against… I just want everyone involved to understand the risks of what’s happening here.” I was speechless again, but not in a starstruck way. “We’ll do everything we can to protect you, of course. I have a whole super top secret database of all the possible targets of all the heroes’ villains and I have protocols in place that everyone is filled in on, even Peter. If something happened to you, you would have every superpowered being still on the Earth looking for you and protecting you. I, personally, will be the first to respond, okay?”

“Okay…” I didn’t know what more to say.

“I know that was a lot. And I don’t want to rain on your and Peter’s big gay rainbow parade together, I just…”

“I get it. Thanks.”

“Are you okay?”

“I mean it’s not gonna stop me from being with Peter,” I felt Tony let out a sigh of relief. He really did care about Peter. “But… it does freak me out.”

“Totally understandable. Just take your time with… all of that.”

“Sir, we’re approaching our destination.” A female Irish accent emerged around us.

“Wait we’re upstate already? Isn’t traffic crazy at this time on Fridays?”

“Kid, do you think Tony Stark deals with traffic?” He rolled down the window next to where I was sitting. We were hundreds of feet above the ground. The wheels had turned so they were parallel with the ground and repulsers were emerging from them. I couldn’t help but feel like a little kid in an airplane for the first time. Tony Stark was chuckling across from me.

“It never gets old,” I heard him say to himself under his breath.


	14. A Car Ride to Remember

I walked into Peter’s recovery room at the New Avengers Facility. I was surprised to see him out of bed, spryly hopping around the room (literally) gathering his things together in a duffel bag laid out on the bed.

“Woah! You’ve gotten so much better since I last saw you! Look at you!” Peter looked up from his duffel bag and turned around. His eyes lit up when he saw me. He ran up to me and grabbed my head, pushing my mouth into his. He kissed me quickly and passionately before saying,

“Now look what I can do” He took his healed leg and reached it up, wrapping it around my waist. He pushed my pelvis into his with his leg. Between kisses I managed to say,

“Oh my god since when were you this flexible?”

“You have no idea...” He drew me in for another kiss. We heard a knock on the open door behind us as Tony Stark knocked to make his presence known. Peter leapt away from my body and landed swiftly on the bed’s edge. I was left standing awkwardly in the middle of the room.

“Alright, lovebirds, calm down at least close the door before eating each other’s faces. Anyways, time to get you on home, Peter. I have a car waiting for you two out front to take you both back to the city.” It was as if Tony Stark read my mind because seconds later he said, “No, it’s not another flying car that’s just for the boss man. I gotta go do something more important than supervising hormonal teens but the car’s gonna be leaving in ten minutes.” Tony walked out of the room and Peter let out a large exhale and laid back onto the bed, his arms above his head. I took a long glance at his abs that poked out as his shirt lifted up.

“Hey it wasn’t that bad, Tony didn’t seem to care,” I said as I laid down on top of him. He wrapped his arms around me.

“Yeah, but he’s my mentor do you have any idea how embarrassing that is??” He closed his eyes tightly in embarrassment.

“Come on, let’s get to the car.” Peter nodded and puckered his lips out to me. I gave him a quick peck and he tried to make it longer and more passionate.

“Nuh uh, not until you get into the car.”

“Fiiiiiiine.” Peter said as he playfully dragged himself out of the bed and followed me out the door.

Once in the car, which despite not being able to fly was still completely decked out, Peter slammed the door behind us and flattened me out against the seating that lined the entire car compartment. We immediately started making out. I have no clue how long this happened for — we both lost completely track of the world around us. It was just me and him. Him and me. Our lips. His tongue in my mouth. Mine in his. I reached underneath his shirt and felt up his abs that were permanently carved into his body after the hours spent swinging through the city, fifty stories in the air. He was reaching around my body and squeezing my butt. I was tugging gently on his ear as he ran his hands through my hair. We broke away for a moment after he said,

“I’m sorry I need water you’re like sucking all the moisture out of my mouth.”

“Oh my god I’m so sorry!”

“Nononono! Don’t be sorry! I wasn’t complaining...” He gave me a flirtatious smile as he pecked me on the lips. He grabbed a bottle of water from the built-in mini fridge. I looked under the wrap-around seating for one of those nozzle things I saw earlier. “What are you looking for?” Peter asked.

“There was this crazy magical nozzle thing in the car over here and I wanted to—“

“OH MY GOD!!!! The nozzle!!!! I remember seeing that when Mr. Stark took me to fight with Cap and everyone! It’s so crazy!”

“I know!” We both laughed. He leaned back and I laid down, resting my head in his lap. I made little kissy noises at him and he returned them back at me. “My friends aren’t gonna believe this.”

“Believe what?”

“All of this!” I gestured to the car around us. “And us most of all.”

“Oh.”

“What?”

“You haven’t told anyone yet. About us. Right?”

“No... Why?”

“Well... it’s...” Peter shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

“What’s up?”

“I don’t really want anyone to know.” I was stunned into silence for a moment.

“Why?”

“I’m not really... out.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. And I’m not ready for people to know yet.”

“That’s okay.” I sat up and placed my hand on his back and gently rubbed it.

“Does anyone else know?”

“Mr. Stark but beyond that...”

“Tony Stark knows you’re gay but not anyone else?! Your life is insane.”

“I’m not gay, though. I’m bi.”

“Oh! That’s cool.”

“Really?” Peter looked up at me, nervous.

“Of course! Why wouldn’t it be?”

“I dunno...” He slumped down into himself. I put my arm around him and he leaned into me.

“Of course I won’t tell anyone but Kitty and all my friends from school do know about the whole kissing thing.”

“Who’s Kitty?”

“My best friend. The screaming one from the park.”

“Ahhhhh.” He laughed a little. It made me happy to see him get happy again after being down. “Well I never talked to you about it before now but if you wouldn’t mind just telling your everyone that you decided I wasn’t flirting with you or anything and just... I dunno maybe just not talk about me with them for a while so they just sort of forget?”

“Sure, of course.” It kind of hurt to know he wanted to keep me a secret. I knew it wasn’t because of me per sé but... still. Of course that was his choice and I couldn’t force anything but it just felt like my life would be filled with even more secrets right when I thought the secrets were over. But clearly Peter was still dealing with a lot of stuff and I couldn’t force him to do anything, so I decided I had to be there for him. I wanted to be there for him. “When did you figure it out? That you’re bi, I mean.”

“Well I was always into girls I always knew that but in the last few years I’ve just noticed myself liking a lot of boys. You kinda... sealed the deal, if that makes sense?”

“Like...”

“Like the first boy I’ve ever had a crush or, like, tried to be with at all.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I guess it was cause I was at a new school I thought I had a little more freedom to do new things and everything since no one really knew me or payed attention to me. And being Spider-Man it was like I could be as open about it as I wanted to be and no one would know. That’s why even before school and all of that the whole Spider-Boy thing happened cause Spider-Man just gives me that protection.”

“Huh.”

“What?”

“It’s weird I just... I’ve never thought of being a superhero in that way. Like not just an escape from your life but a way to live life as openly as possible cause no one knows it’s you doing the living.”

“Yeah. It’s nice being able to just be whoever I wanna be for a bit.” I gave him a little squeeze with my arm draped around his shoulders.

“Do you think your aunt would be okay with it?”

“I mean, yeah. I do think so. I just... she’s been through so much recently. With my uncle dying and all and then me being Spider-Man it’s the last thing she needs.”

“Okay. Just do it when you’re ready.” Peter nodded and sunk further back into me. “Hey, you.” Peter craned his neck to look at me upside down while still leaning against me. “If your aunt doesn’t know we only have a limited window in this car to be all touchy before we have to act all plutonic.”

“Oh really? What were you thinking exactly?”

“I dunno...” Peter sat up off of me and turned around, straddling my body while I stayed where I was sitting.

“Did it look something like this?”

“Maybe...” Peter passionately kissed me, shoving his tongue into my mouth.

“Woah there! Someone’s anxious to get started again!” Peter broke off of my mouth.

“Hey I didn’t ask you to bring up my sexuality and the stop the groove we were having.” I laughed.

“Fair.” I pulled his head back towards mine.

For the rest of the hour and a half car ride, Peter and I were deeply tangled up with one another. By the time the driver’s voice came on the intercom letting us know we would arrive at Peter’s house in 15 minutes, we were lying down on the seat, Peter’s head resting on my bare chest and his leg draped over my thigh as he made out with me gently. Both of our shirts and pants were strewn throughout the car cabin.

“Well that was really fun.” Peter broke the silence.

“Oh, really? I barely noticed all the fun you were having.” I teased sarcastically.

“Shut up!” Peter pushed himself off of me.

“I’m not sure what gave you away though... was it the moaning when I was kissing your neck or was it when you eagerly took your hand and started—“

“Shhhhhh!!! The driver’s gonna hear you!”

“Oh, trust me, if he could have heard us this whole time what I’m saying now would be the last thing he’d be made uncomfortable by.” Peter laughed and laid on top of me, his chin resting on my chest as he looked up at me. I lifted my head up and gave him a soft kiss.

“I really like you Gus Myers.” I instantly grinned ear to ear.

“I really like you more Peter Parker.” Peter blushed. “But I think I like this a little more, sorry.” I reached over him and gave his butt a squeeze. Peter laughed and gave me a little kiss.

We spent the remainder of the car ride putting our clothes back on and checking to make sure we didn’t look entirely disheveled. I stole many a glance at his sculpted abs.

“I see you staring, you know.” Peter said as he was slipping his pants on.

“Ugh what can I say it’s the perk of having Spider-Man as my boyfriend — let me enjoy it!”

“Oh, is that the only perk then?”

“Yeah pretty much. That and your extreme flexibility.” Peter threw his shirt at me. “Oh, thank you. Now you have to be shirtless. My plan succeeds.”

“Do you have an off button or something?” Peter asked as he made his way to my side of the car. “Don’t think I let that slip by, by the way.”

“Let what slip by?”

“‘The perk of having Spider-Man as your boyfriend.’”

“Oh no was that too soon? I’m sorry we don’t have to—“ Peter placed his finger on my lips.

“Gus, no. I like it.” Peter kissed me and ran his hand through my hair while stealing his shirt away with his other hand.

“Oh my god was that all a ploy to get your shirt back?”

“Pretty much.” Peter said, laughing as he put his shirt back on.

After we kissed goodbye (more like made out goodbye) in the car, the driver drove me home, too. As I was getting ready for bed later that night, I got a text from Peter.

“night night! I’m gonna be dreaming of you ;) xx (but not just normal xx’s big slobbery make out xx’s)” I smiled. Even with keeping Peter undercover, things were looking up for me.


	15. An Empire State of Mind

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that the first time I posted this chapter it was cut off randomly. It should be in its full now.

“So what ever happened between you and Peter?” Kitty and Mels were at my house hanging out one day after school and Mels was asking the exact questions I didn’t want to have to come up with answers to. “I mean the last I remember you were mad at him even though he apologized about the kiss because he had to go with Tony Stark or something? I don’t even know anymore I give up with you two.”

“Yeah, I mean, I think I just misread the situation. I talked with Peter about it and he never liked me at all or anything.”

“Wait, what?” Kitty asked.

“Yeah. And now that I know he never liked me, getting mad at him for all of that seems kinda ridiculous.” I wasn’t sure how I was handling the situation.

“That doesn’t make any sense he literally tried to kiss you before freaking out about the explosion at the party!” Kitty was seeing right through my lies.

“Yeah, what even? This makes no sense.” Mels wasn’t having any of it either.

“Nonono apparently he... uh... just was leaning past me to grab something behind me when all of that happened.”

“I don’t know about you but this just sounds like he’s closeted and doesn’t know how to deal with liking a guy or something.” Mels said.

“Well, I’m over him either way. I’m not gonna go chasing after someone who isn’t ready to be with another boy.” I was scrambling to piece a story together.

"What about Spider-Man? Any interest in him still?” Kitty asked. I totally forgot I told my friends about the whole Spider-kiss. “Or are you still creeped out by him?”

“Total creep! Never talking to that weirdo amirite?” I looked at Mels’ and Kitty’s faces frantically. They both looked at me, puzzled. Just then, I felt my phone buzz in my pocket. I took a peak at it. It was a text from Peter:

“I finished up that bio lab I missed last week early! In elevator now xx”

“Who was that?” Mels asked.

“Uhhh... a text from my mom. She wants you guys out of the house pretty soon.”

“Why?” Kitty asked.

“She has to, um, make dinner and doesn’t like to be disturbed!” I frantically texted Peter: “HIDE -- MELS AND KITTY STILL HERE LEAVING NOW”

“Oh okay... when should we leave?” Kitty asked.

“Like now! Yeah she’s about to come up the elevator.”

“Oh shit yeah let’s run Kitty.” Mels said as she slipped her shoes on. I ushered them out the door as fast as I could. After the elevator door shut behind them in the hall I leaned against my door frame outside my apartment.

“Where’d you hide?” I texted Peter. Suddenly Peter dropped from the ceiling upside down, hanging onto a web line. His face stopped right at mine.

“Oh my god! You can’t just jump out at me like that!”

“Sorry sorry! I thought it was cute and everything cause of, you know, that first first time we kissed.”

“Okay, fair. It wasn’t the worst idea. But no hallway kisses for you out here you’re the one with the secret identity and the secret boyfriend!” He flipped down from the ceiling and tore the web line off the ceiling quickly, following me into my apartment.

“You know you didn’t have to send Mels and Kitty away like that.”

“No it’s fine! Don’t worry about it!”

"Seriously, Gus, listen to me. This isn’t just a secret relationship thing, I mean it sorta is, but I know there’s gonna be a lot of sneaking around and I don’t want it to get in the way of your friendships with your other friends.” He walked up to me and held me from behind, gently kissing my neck. “Same goes for me. Sometimes I’ll be with Ned or my Aunt or MJ and I’ll just want to have some time with them.” I turned around to face him as he continued to hold me. I gave him a little peck.

“I think that’s a good idea. Still, I don’t regret kicking them out today cause it means I get to do this!” I slipped my hand into his pants and underneath his underwear and gave his butt a little squeeze. It was barely squishy because of all the muscle. “Oh my god do you have any fat on your butt?”

“No, but you do!” Peter returned the favor and gave my butt a little squeeze. I leaned in and began passionately making out with him as I squeezed his butt. I could feel Peter pulling away.

“You were the one that wanted to make out in the hallway! What’s up with you now?”

“I have something else in mind...” Peter began stripping in front of me.

“Okay, it really doesn’t seem like you have anything else in mind this is exactly what I wanted to happen too.”

“Nonono it’s not that.” He jogged over to his backpack that he left by the door and pulled his Spider-Man costume out of it. He slipped the loose-fitting spandex over his body then quickly tapped the spider symbol on his chest and it tightened.

“Woah!”

“What?”

“I don’t know, I just thought it was always skin tight. I didn’t know it... shwooped.”

“Shwooped?” Peter asked, laughing.

“Shut up! You know what I mean! Wait does this mean I could, like, fit into it?”

“Yeah, it can fit pretty much anyone.”

"Can I try it??”

“Later, sure. But now, I have a surprise for you.” Peter slipped his mask over his face and shot a web line onto the handle of the door leading out onto my apartment’s terrace. He yanked the door open and started walking towards the terrace. “Come on, don’t just stand there.” He gestured me towards where he was standing on the terrace. As I stood next to him he wrapped his arm around my side and pulled me close next to him. “Close the door behind us.”

“Where are we going?” I asked as I reached behind us and closed the door.

“Anywhere.” Before I knew it, I was eight stories above the ground and my terrace was far behind me. “Here, hold onto my neck so I can swing with both hands.” I carefully wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled myself close to his face, resting my chin on his shoulder. I held on as tight as I could. “It’s okay... loosen your grip and relax. I got you.” I followed his instructions. “Look around you, enjoy the ride.”

I looked around us. The wind was whipping my hair about violently but everything was so peaceful. I could feel Peter’s warm body holding me and keeping me safe. The streets below us were milling about with hundreds of New Yorkers minding their own business. I could hear the faint honking on the traffic-ridden 14th street as we swung across town.

“This is amazing.” I said.

“I’ve gotten so used to it I forgot just how incredible it all is.” Peter kept us afloat above the city, swinging from building to building and zipping across rooftops. “Where do you wanna go?”

Peter’s question jolted me out of my gazing at the city.

“Anywhere. Everywhere. Just... show me the world.” Peter perched on a building for a moment.

“Lift up my mask for me, will you? Just the mouth part.”

“Why?” I asked as I unveiled Peter’s thin but soft lips from under his mask.

“So I can kiss you for saying the corniest thing of all time.”

“Hey! That was romantic if anything! No kisses for you, asshole!”

“What?? Fine no more swinging for you. Guess I’ll just drop you off.” Peter tossed me into the air playfully. I laughed for a moment before realizing that Peter tossed me straight off the building. I was plummeting towards the street 30 stories below me and fast. I was too scared to say anything. Before I knew it my whole body was whipped to the side as Peter swung in and caught me.

“That was your punishment for not giving me a kiss.” Peter joked.

“I get you were trying to make something cute out of that but it sounded more creepy and abuse-y than cute.” I said as I caught my breath, safe and sound back in Peter’s arms.

“Okay I realized how weird it sounded after I said it, to be fair. But come on, I have something to show you.” Peter continued swinging but in an upwards direction, circling us around one building in particular. He landed softly on the side of it and shot two web lines towards the top of the building and ran backwards until they were stretched to the max. “Hold on!”

Peter let go of the wall with his feet and we were slingshotted at a rapid pace straight up into the air. Once we slowed down, we were just in level with the very top of the building. Peter swung us over onto the antenna perched at its peak and rested us at the antenna’s base. We were on the Empire State Building.

“Now this has to make you wanna kiss me, come on.” I looked out over the city. We were higher than even the observation deck. I couldn’t even see the people milling about on the street below us we were so high up. “Now I also have a special treat for you...” Peter leapt into the air and grabbed a plastic bag webbed onto the side of the building’s antenna and landed swiftly and soundlessly back where he was moments before. “Chinese food!”

“Shut. Up.”

“I asked Mr. Stark a favor and had him hack your Seamless account—“

“Wait, what?”

“Shh it was for a romantic gesture listen to me. Aaaaaand through that we learned your favorite Chinese food is from Sammy’s Noodles on 6th Avenue, specifically their cold sesame noodles and pan fried pork dumplings. I also got us some general tso’s chicken and white rice cause who doesn’t love chicken in MSG-packed Chinese flavoring sauces, amirite? Oh, and my webbing insulated the heat so it should still be warm from when I put it there about...”

“3 hours ago, Peter.” Karen interjected.

“Yes! Thanks Karen! 3 hours ago! So, there you have it!” Peter put the food in front of me and took his mask off, resting his fists on the sides of hips proudly.

“You planned all of this?” His hair was tossled and messy from being underneath the mask. He was grinning ear to hear and his cute dimples were showing more than ever. I drew him in for a long, passionate kiss.

“Ahaha! I win!!!” Peter exclaimed as he broke away from the kiss for a brief moment.

“Shut up and kiss me.” We made out against the needle of the Empire State Building for the next half hour. At one point, Peter pressed his pelvis against mine as he pushed me against the needle. I could feel everything that the kissing was doing to him in his pants, and he could feel the same on me. He took his hand and gently started making his way into my pants and under my underwear. With his other hand he started unbuttoning my pants and unzipping my zipper, before I stopped him.

“We’re on the top of the Empire State Building I’m not about to let you take my dick out!”

“Why not? No one’s around here!” Peter said between leaving kisses on my neck.

“Cause... I don’t know we’re on the top of the Empire State Building! Those news cameras found us and Spider-Boy started on the top of a building!”

“Alright, alright. We’ll eat now and save the fun for later.” Peter gave me a little peck as he sat himself down, his legs dangling off the edge of the small balcony. I sat down next to him and cuddled against him, taking in all of his warmth. The sun was setting and it was starting to get chilly all the way up there. “You have to admit though getting a blowjob from Spider-Man on the top of the Empire State Building would have been pretty legendary.”

“... okay fine that does sound pretty unforgettable. Let’s eat then maybe we can do a lil somethin’ somethin’ back at my place later.” I gave Peter a kiss on the cheek and whispered in his ear quickly, “We wait until we get back and maybe I’ll get my hands (or mouth) on that Spider-Dick of yours.” Peter’s eyes lit up out of excitement and laughter.

“Eat faster!!!” He joked as I opened up the Chinese food. “Ugh, dang it! Looks like our time spent making out cancelled out all of the good warming work my webbing did the chicken’s all cold!”

“Whatever, MSG is delicious no matter the temperature.”

“Vewy twue!” Peter said as he stuffed noodles into his mouth with his bare hands. “Wha? Nowone cawes if we’we messhy up hewe!” I laughed as I stuffed a full dumping into my mouth and poured a small amount of dumpling sauce directly into my mouth afterwards. “Hawt. Stowp you’we mahkin me hawd.” Peter said in response to my eating as he attempted to chew the mouthful of noodles.

“Like you’we nah thah alweady.” I said as I flicked the obvious boner still hanging around in his spandex after our makeout session.

Peter swallowed before saying, “What! I’m staying ready for your house later!” I laughed and gave him a kiss.

“Mmm you’re extra tasty tonight.” I said as I licked the sesame sauce on my lips left from the noodles he stuffed in his mouth.

“Maybe I should just keep my lips always covered in sesame sauce so you’ll always want to kiss me!”

“Dang it! You figured out my biggest kink and therefore my biggest weakness!” Peter was cackling with laughter.

“Why are you always so funny?!” Peter asked between laughs.

“I’m the funny one? You’re the clown in the red and blue tights!” Peter’s face fell flat and he looked at me, unimpressed. “Okay, fair, fair. Calling superheroes clowns cause they wear spandex is very overdone. I’ll come up with better material next time.”

“You better or no ride home for you!”

“Hey!” I pushed Peter off the ledge, but he had his feet up and resting against the wall he was sitting on and he just extended his legs so that he was standing against the wall, parallel to the ground.

“Really? I have spider powers, pushing me off of walls doesn’t really scare me. You on the other hand...” He grabbed my hand suddenly and yanked me off of the wall. I hung off of the antenna via Peter’s grip on me.

“Yawn. Been there, done that. Come up with some new ways to scare me.”

“Oh, really? I can think of a way or two. How much would you enjoy that drop without your vision or mobility?” Before I knew it, webs were covering my eyes, binding my hands behind my back, and binding my feet together. “Enjoy the ride!” I felt the wind rush around me as Peter swung me off of the side of the building.

“LAME!” I shouted out behind me. Or at least what I thought was behind me. I knew Peter was going to catch me in a second but it was scary nonetheless to be plummeting to your potential death with no vision or ability to move anywhere. “VERY FUNNY PETER! NOW COME AND GRAB ME!” Five seconds must have passed by. I knew he was going to catch me but it was taking longer than I thought. “PETEEEER! PETER!” I was falling faster and faster. I don’t know how, but I could sense the ground approaching and fast. The sound of cars honking and people on the street talking were growing from nonexistent to faint and in the distance. I was squirming to get my hands free so I could tear the webbing off of my eyes. “SOMEONE HELP!” I heard a woman in the distance scream and others saying things like “Oh my god...” “How did he get there?” “Is he gonna die?” I was panicking. Peter would have caught me by now. What happened to him? Was he okay? That didn’t matter. I could hear people clearly talking. I heard a man shout out, “What’s that thing that’s got Spider-Man up there?”

Oh, god. This was the end. All for a flirty joke. And now Peter was fighting a bad guy. I heard a car’s honking grow closer. I heard people’s screams grow louder as I neared the street. All the sound in my ears was culminating. It was just a mash of a car screeching to a halt, a car being rear ended, people’s shouts of fear, people’s yelps of shock, children crying, the hum of the city below me. Close by. Closer. 10 feet away. 5 feet away. 3 feet. 2. 1.

Silence.


	16. The Itsy-Bitsy Spider

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PETER'S POV!!!!!!!

As I swung Gus from the side of the building, my gut dropped for a second. I knew he would be safe and sound in my arms in a second or two but seeing him hurtling through the air towards the ground was unnerving. But the second I heard him shout out, “LAME!” as he fell I decided I’d let him fall for a few more seconds just to scare him a little bit. I heard him shout out “VERY FUNNY PETER! NOW COME AND GRAB ME!” and I knew he was getting stressed. I pulled my mask over my face and perched against the needle base. I launched myself into the open air in front of me, using my web wings to glide over the edge of the Empire State Building, then tightening my arms and legs into my body so I plummeted to the ground quickly. Right as I was about twenty feet away from Peter, a large object slammed into me, pinning me to the side of the Empire State Building.

“GET OFF OF ME!” I used all of my strength to try to push whatever was pinning me to the wall off. It was a metal sphere a little larger than a basketball with four mechanical arms protruding from its sides, each arm pinning down one of my limbs. It kept my arms on the sides of my body so that I couldn’t use the full force of my muscles to push against the mechanical arms. The sphere was blocking my view of where Gus was falling but I could hear his screams of terror in the distance. “Karen— deploy web bombs from my wrists now.”

“Peter, the force of the bomb at such close range could cause you damage as—“

“NOW, KAREN!”

“Of, course, sir. Deploying we—“ Karen was cut off by the mechanical arms tightening around my wrists. I heard the sound of the web shooters breaking.

“Sir, web shooters seem to be—“

“I can see, Karen! Is there any way to— ARGH!” I shouted out as Karen’s voice was replaced by a loud ringing in my ears, followed by a total shutdown of all the systems in my suit.

Suddenly, I heard a loud crash in the street below us, followed by the screams of bystanders. I went limp. That was Gus. It had to be. This was all my fault. I shouldn’t have thrown him like that. It was my responsibility to protect him. Mine and mine alone. And I failed him. Him and Uncle Ben. Both gone because of me. I didn’t even realize it but my mask was soaked from tears. If this robot hadn’t stopped me, I could have saved him. This — I strained all the muscles in my body — stupid — I pushed against the mechanical arms with every ounce of pain that I was feeling — ROBOT — I pushed it off of me.

In a fit of rage and anguish I leapt into the air, simultaneously grabbing one of the robot’s arms and taking it with me. It tried to squirm out of my grasp but I was too strong for it. I smashed it against the side of the Empire State Building then dragged it as I ran vertically up the building back towards the antenna. One of its other arms came forward and seized the back of my head, pulling me backwards and tearing the mask off of my head. I didn’t care. Nothing mattered. I just needed to destroy this robot. For Gus.

I tumbled off of the side of the building, but the robot held me by my head so I was dangling off of the building. I swung my body weight away from the building then back towards it rapidly, allowing myself to crash into one of the windows of the building, freeing myself from its grasp. I sprinted out of the office space I had crashed into and into the hallway to where the elevators were. I could hear the clanging of the robot chasing after me, just as I wanted it to do. I pried the elevator doors open and scrambled up the shaft towards the very top of the building. Once I reached the top floor, I propelled myself against the elevator doors and they broke apart, surrounding me with the cool New York City evening air. We were one story away from the base of the antenna, where Gus and I were having a date moments before. Where we were happy. Before I lost everything.

I leapt into the air and landed right where I wanted to be; on the very top point of the antenna. I saw the robot crawling up towards me, its arms propelling it through the air at an unnervingly rapid pace. It seized one of my legs and yanked me down off of my perch, sending the side of my torso straight into the antenna’s point, leaving a gash there. I didn’t feel it, though. The adrenaline was too high. It was just me and the robot now. No suit, no webs, no gadgets. Just my raw strength against a mass of metal.

I grabbed onto the sphere as I tumbled downward and pulled myself back up so I was standing on top of the sphere. I crouched low on top of it, placing my body as close as I could to the sphere. One of its arms was soon racing directly towards me. Right as it was inches away from me I rolled out of the way and off of the sphere, landing gently at the base of the antenna. Its arm lodged itself directly into its own body. Sparks went flying but it was still mostly functional. It tried to pull its own arm out of itself but it wouldn’t budge. Perfect. I ran up the side of the antenna and on my way hooked my arm into the loop made between the sphere and its own arm, carrying it into the air with me. Its other arms were trying to grab me but their calibration was all off from the damage it caused to itself and they were all missing me. I leapt into the air at the peak of the antenna. At the height of my jump, I rotated my body so I was bringing the full force of the robot’s weight back down, directly onto the point of the antenna. The antenna tore straight through it. The robot’s arms twitched for a moment before falling limp and draping down along the side of the antenna. I perched myself on the side of the antenna and looked out upon the city. Everything was still. I could hear the distant sirens in the street below The police must have been dealing with the aftermath of Gus’ fall. I felt like I was going to vomit. It was a joke. It was just supposed to be a joke. How could this happen? I sobbed into my hands. Oh, god. His friends. His family. His whole life ahead of him. Ended because of me.

“S-s-s-s-s-top your cry-y-y-y-ing Spider-Ma-a-a-a-a-n.” A robotic voice echoed from the broken shell of the robot. The damages to the robot caused the voice to stutter. I looked up towards it. One of the claws on one of its arms was pointed at me, revealing a small camera in the center of it. “Your frie-e-e-e-e-nd is ali-i-i-i-ve.”

“What?” I wiped the tears off of my face.

“Me-e-e-e-e-t me u-u-u-nder Pier For-r-r-r-ty in o-o-o-o-ne hour. An-n-n-n-d don’t bri-i-i-i-ng any of you-r-r-r-r super friends. Or-r-r-r-r else both he-e-e-e-e dies-s-s-s-s and your id-d-d-d-d-entity will be revea-a-a-aled, Peter Parker-r-r-r-r.” The arm fell limp and I could hear the mechanics within the robot whirr to a halt. I felt my face and touched my bare skin. My mask was torn off during the fight. How could I be so stupid?! There was only one thing to do now: save Gus. Even if my identity was on the line now, Gus was more important. No backup. No webs. No gadgets. A gash torn through my side. My identity on the line. All up against someone whose robot minion put up a good fight. What could go wrong?


	17. The Octopus' Lair

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PETER'S POV!!!!!

I took a web cartridge from my belt and slammed it against the concrete base of the antenna, sending yards of webbing shooting in various directions from the compact and pressurized web fluid within the cartridge. I tore off a stretch of webbing and used it to bandage my side. It wasn’t going to do much for me, but it would be something to keep my body together while chasing after the mysterious man who took Gus. I ripped off another piece of webbing from the mass of exploded web cartridge and wrapped it around my face, providing me some basic protection for my identity. I wasn’t working with much, but I did the best I could. I lastly picked up the trash from the dinner Gus and I were sharing before... The least I could do was not litter on the top of the Empire State Building. I leapt from the building and landed on the building on the opposite side of the street. I jumped down between buildings until I was near street level, where I hopped onto the roof of a crosstown bus. I had to come up with some unconventional methods of travel without my web shooters.

After about twenty minutes of hitching rides on the roofs of public transport, I found myself in front of Pier 40. No one was along the Hudson River at this time of night, so I didn’t have to worry about any people seeing Spider-Man running around the city bandaged up while wearing a makeshift mask made of webbing.

“Under Pier 40?” I asked to myself. I walked to the side of the massive building of parking spaces and sport fields. I crouched down and crawled over the edge of the pier to its underside. Large wooden and cement pillars held up the structure and the sound of water lapping up against them echoed underneath the pier. “Hello? Anyone there? Mr. Robot Man?” My words echoed back to me but there was no response. I crawled to the center of the pier and hung off of the side of a pillar. I could barely see without any light or my mask with its night vision. A faint glow from the water illuminated the underside of the pier.

Suddenly, something grabbed my ankle and I was pulled underwater. I struggled to escape its grasp but it was strong and had a tight grip on me. The cold water was stinging my wound. The water was only getting colder as I was dragged down through it. I didn’t know how much longer I could hold my breath. Was this how it was going to end for me? Dragged underwater into the Hudson River? I should have known to take more precaution. Damn it, the thought of losing Gus really was distracting me. Suddenly, bright lights illuminated the water around me. I was in an aged metal chamber with grates on the bottom. I looked up and two doors slid shut above me, sealing the chamber off from the river. The water remaining in the chamber began draining out through the grates and whatever was holding onto my foot let me go. I fell to the bottom of the chamber, gasping for air. I was shivering from the water and could barely move. The wall to the right of me slid open, revealing a dimly lit passageway. Only one way to go...

I stumbled down the hallway. It wasn’t wet like the entry chamber was but you could feel the cold, moldy, moisture in the air. My head hurt slightly from the air pressure. I must have been brought to the bottom of the Hudson River. I reached the end of the passageway and there was an opening to the left. I walked through it and into a massive chamber. Monitors showing maps of the city and live news channels were covering the walls and in one corner there was a large tube filled with a neon green fluid and... Gus! I rushed to the tube. He was wearing nothing except a pair of what seemed to be high-tech black underwear. Various tubes were entering and exiting his body at various points. Blood was flowing into his body through some tubes and strange dark blue liquid was coming out of his body through others. A mask covered his mouth and nose, supplying what must have been oxygen. His chest was moving up and down as if he was breathing. He was badly bruised and cut up all over his body as if he... fell from a building.

“I told you.” I spun around quickly as I heard the slimy, nasaly voice from behind me. “I told you he was alive.” I was face-to-face with a small portly man with a bad bowl cut wearing small green goggles and a large brown trench coat. The most disturbing part about him, however, were the four massive mechanical arms that protruded from his back. They resembled the arms that the robot had, each with their own claws. The four arms quickly planted themselves in the ground and lifted the man twenty feet into the air above me.

“Let him out!” I lunged at the man but one of his arms swiftly swatted me to the side, sending me into a pile of broken and used machine parts in the corner. The man snickered and gestured to the monitors around him.

“I can’t, you fool. Didn’t you take a moment to see what happened?” I looked to the screens surrounding us. I fixed my gaze on one news station in particular.

“The footage you are about to see might be found disturbing and frightening to some viewers.” The newscaster warned. The screen cut to a video taken on the phone of someone who was on the street where Gus fell. It was shaky but it was focused on an object falling rapidly from the sky. Not an object. Gus. I wanted to look away but I couldn’t. I could hear him screaming among the screams of the people on the street. Before I knew it, his body smashed into the hood of an empty parked car on the side of the street. Gus' blood and glass from the car windows scattered themselves on the street and surrounding vehicles. He died. He had to have. But before the video ended, more screaming was heard in the distance. The video panned over to where a series of vehicles were being tossed to the side of the street like toys. A figure emerged from the wreckage. The same figure standing in the same room as me now. He grabbed Gus’ limp body from the wreckage with two of his extended arms and quickly scattered away and out of sight.

“I‘ve been watching you for a long time, Spider, and when I saw your little stunt with your friend here, well, I saw a perfect opportunity for both of us to succeed.”

“He’s more than a friend asshole! He’s...” I trailed off.

“Oh, lover boys! Even better!” I lunged at him, screaming. I wasn’t thinking because seconds later the man swatted me against the wall again. “Oh please, Peter. You can’t even dream of hurting me. I have a little proposition that will make us both happy.” I wiped the blood off of my face and restrained myself from trying to attack again. “There’s a serum. I need it for my own... ideas. However it can also be used to save your boyfriend. I’m keeping him barely alive with my superior life support systems that I devised myself, but the serum can stabilize his body. Give it an encouraging boost to heal itself.”

“What kind of serum is this? I’m not gonna let you pump him up with toxic drugs!”

“If you say so. But it’s the only chance you have of saving your boyfriend.” He turned around and began leaving the room.

“Wait!" He stopped dead in his tracks. "Why won’t you just get it yourself?”

“These arms may be powerful but they’re a bit noisy, wouldn’t you say? Only you’re stealthy enough to sneak into where this serum is held.”

“And where’s that?” One of his arms reached behind him and pressed a button on the monitor. A screen blinked up pinpointing a location in deep Brooklyn.

“Roxxon Energy Corporation. Big oil front on the outside but they’re not the most legal business around. Some secret insider stuff such as...” the screen changed to show a layout of a building with a highlighted room. Another screen turned on showing a vial with two metal ends and a bright blue liquid on the inside. “This serum. Additionally, I acknowledge that it might be difficult to sneak in without any tech support so I made something for you.” A section of the wall swung open and revealed a new Spider-Man costume. It was mostly black except for two red web shooters and my usual red mask but with black eyepieces. The red from the mask also travelled down to cover my shoulders and chest. “A bit stealthier in my opinion. Also, it’s filled with all the same tech you found in your original suit from Tony Stark except a little more... sophisticated.”

“How did you... how can you...”

“Like I said, boy, I’ve been watching you for a long time.”

“Who are you?”

“Doctor Otto Ocatvius. But my peers nicknamed me...” He snickered under his breath, “Doctor Octopus. It’s really quite clever once you think about it. It got me all in a fuss back when they started teasing me. So bad, in fact, that I killed them.” He was cackling to himself now. “But really they were just quite clever. A shame. Anyways, I take it you’ll be accepting my proposition?” I didn’t have much choice. He had control over Gus’ life and I knew I wasn’t strong enough to defeat him right then and there. And even if I did, Gus would pay for it.

“Fine, Doc Ock. You got a deal.”

“Don’t forget to shake!” He extended one of his metal arms out to me. I warily took its claw in mine and felt a sharp pinch in the center of my palm. “Oh, don’t mind that. Just a little tracking device. One little step off the path to and from the serum and I can kill you instantly through that device.” I rubbed the drop of blood forming in the center of my hand away. “Now suit up, Spider, you won’t be able to use the cover of the night forever.”

I walked to the wall and quickly changed suits. It was surprisingly lightweight. It felt like I had nothing on at all. I felt a lot more aerodynamic just moving my arms around. The suit activated itself and a map of how to get to the Roxxon lab came on my eyepieces. I also was able to see a series of web options for the web shooters. Even more than on Mr. Stark’s suit. I suddenly felt a jolt on my back and turned my head over my shoulder to see four sleek red arms protruding from my back.

“I couldn’t _not_ make a personal touch.”

“How do I—“

“They’ll just do whatever will help you most. The suit has a mind of its own, I guess you could say.” He snickered.

I took one last look at Gus, suspended in that tube.

“I’ll get you back. I promise.” I whispered under my breath. An opening emerged above me, revealing a tunnel about 5 feet wide that reached all the way up to the surface of the river we were under.

“Get a move on!”

I shot a webline to the ceiling next to the opening. It shot out even faster than my usual suit. I pulled myself up and the arms abruptly took over, piercing the sides of the tube and scaling upwards. In a matter of seconds I reached the fresh air.

“Remember, not only is Gus’ life in your hands, but everyone else you love in your life, too. I know who you are, Peter Parker. Never forget that.”


	18. The Spider-Octopus Swings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PETER’S POV!!!!

The alarms wailed in my ears as I sprinted to the end of the hallway. I heard the gunshots behind me from the automated machine guns located in the ceilings of the high-tech facility. I also heard the clanging as the robotic arms on my back swiftly swatted the bullets to my side or stopped them dead in their tracks. I was clenching the serum tightly in my right hand. The heist went off... relatively well. Until I completely missed the final sensor in the lab right in front of the door and sent off every alarm in the building. I leapt into the air towards the window and the arms formed an “X” in front of me, shielding myself from the blast. A large virtual arrow that only I could see through my eyepieces emerged in the sky above me, pointing me to the way back to Ock‘s lair. I swung through the cool New York evening air. It was almost not even evening anymore. I could see the faint rays of sun breaking over the horizon behind me as I swung West back into Manhattan and towards the Hudson River. I was already at the Brooklyn Bridge. I knew it was the suit of a super villain but I would definitely have to incorporate some of this tech into my suit when all of this was over. I shook the thought that this might not be over by the morning away, focusing on the fact that this serum had to save Gus.

I heard police sirens below me and looked down to see a trail of about 20 cop cars chasing after me. Damn it, they must have caught up with me after the lab. A small box showing a news report emerged in the corner of my eyepieces. They were broadcasting a live video of me swinging across the city, serum in hand.

“Masked vigilante Spider-Man is currently being chased by the NYPD after stealing a very valuable and confidential serum from a Roxxon Energy Corporation lab in Brooklyn very early this morning. He seems to be sporting a new look, too. Definitely a lot more sinister. Could this be a symbol of his turn to the criminal side?”

Having the press turn on me was the last thing that I needed in a time like this.

“Okay suit, uhh, any way to lose all of these guys?” A message appeared on my eyepieces:

“Initializing blind blast...” Before I knew it my entire suit lit up. It was almost blinding but my eyepieces activated a UV protection feature. I kept on swinging as I illuminated the city around me for blocks until the light eventually faded. The light gave me time to lose the police and news copters as they were momentarily blinded. I was just a few blocks away from Gus now. So close to this all being over. Suddenly I heard another gunshot from below me. A police car that was somehow not blinded from the light was still trailing after me and trying to shoot me down. Suddenly the arms lurched downwards and threw my momentum off. I just barely was able to land on the ground safely while still carrying the serum.

“What are you guys doing?” They lifted me off from the ground and carried me towards the police car at a rapid pace.

“I don’t want anyone following me back to my hideout, Spider-Man. Sorry.” Doc Ock’s voice echoed in my mask. The arms slammed down onto the hood of the police car and flipped it up over my head.

“NO!” I shouted out. The arms carried my body back towards the car and dragged the two police officers out of the car, holding them up into the air. “STOP IT!” I saw the look of terror in the officers’ eyes. “THEY WON’T FOLLOW ME FROM HERE JUST LEAVE IT!”

“Can’t hurt to make sure they won’t...” Ock said. The arms abruptly smashed them face-first into the pavement. A spray of blood covered the side of the overturned police car.

“NOOOO!!” The arms viscously stabbed into the police officers repeatedly. I was being sprayed with blood. “STOP IT!” The arms stopped.

“Fine. We won’t turn them into complete piles of pulp. But hurry on home, Peter.” I was sobbing into my mask for the second time in one night. Two innocent lives destroyed because of me. But I had the chance to save one more life before the night’s end. The life of the love of my life.

I would have to deal with the consequences of my actions later. I could still do some good tonight. Gus still needed me.


	19. Tick, Tick, Boom

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PETER’S POV!!!!

I swung out above the Hudson River, aiming for the break in the surface of the water where the tube opening was. I dived directly into it and plummeted into Doc Ock’s lab. I landed firmly on the concrete floor and stormed towards Ock.

“I’m going to kill you for that!” I could feel pure rage racing through my veins, but I saw Gus out of the corner of my eye, still barely gripping onto his own life. Me, his last hope. “But another day... another day.” I hung my head low and handed him the serum.

“Perfect! Thank you for your work!” He took the serum with one of his mechanical arms and plugged one of its ends into an opening on the base of the tube Gus was in. About a quarter of it drained from the tube and I could see the light blue glowing liquid of the serum enter Gus’ body from a tube. Immediately he began to jerk around in the water. His eyelids were fluttering open and closed violently. I felt sick watching it happen. While Gus was seizing, Ock took the serum out of Gus’ tube and stored it within one of his own tentacles.

“What are you doing? Doesn’t he need that??”

“Only a little, don’t worry. I need the rest for a... personal project.” I could only deal with one thing at a time so I decided to push away my fears about what Ock could have planned. Gus’ spasms came to a halt and his body became limp while suspended in the fluid. I noticed that all of his scrapes and bruises had healed themselves, but a small trail of blood floated out of his nose into the fluid around him.

“What’s wrong with him?!”

“Patience, Peter, patience.” I waited a few seconds before Gus opened his eyes wide and breathed in a gulp of the fluid. He began coughing immediately and struggled to find air.

“Let him out!” The fluid quickly drained out of the bottom of the tube and Gus crumpled into a ball at the bottom of the tube. A few of the smaller tubes that were inside of him popped out of his body and the remaining liquid in them drained out as they hung there. “Gus!” I banged on the glass, trying to get his attention. A section of the tube slid to the side. I ran into it and scooped Gus into my arms. He was covered in residue of the fluid. It was slimy and sticky and smelled like chemicals. I tried to wipe some of it off but there was too much on him so I just held him. I turned his body towards mine so he was facing me.

“Gus?” I said as I wiped some of the slime off of his eyes and mouth. “Can I take these out?” I turned to Ock as I held the remaining tubes in his body with one hand.

“By all means. Now that he has the serum he’s good as new.” I tore the tubes out of him and felt Gus flinch with pain as I did so.

“It’s okay, it’s okay. I got you now.” I held him close to my body. “I’m never letting go.”

“How sweet. I hate to break up—“ Ock froze as the sound of helicopters got closer. He looked up through the opening leading to the surface of the river. “Damn it! They found it somehow! Anyways, Peter, till we meet again.” Ock climbed into a small room connected to the main chamber. The door slid shut between him and the room I was in. “If you don’t want to lose him again, I’d suggest leaving in about... 30 seconds!” A bright red 30 second timer took over every screen in the lair. The room Ock was in shot off from the compartment and through the window of the door that slid between us I could see that he escaped through a small submarine.

“Come out with your hands up, Spider-Man! We know you’re in there!” A small canister fell from the surface and clattered around the room before releasing a thick smoke. “Tear gas! Gus, look at me!” He slowly turned his face towards me and I webbed his nose and mouth so the webs would filter the air.

“I’m gonna need you to hold your breath for me, okay?” He nodded. I began to lift him up but Gus grabbed my arm first. I faced him, panicked by our current situation but happy that he was getting better.

“Thank you,” He whispered under his breath, “I love you.”

“I love you too.” I leaned down and kissed his forehead softly. Suddenly a loud beeping filled the room. 10 seconds left. “Okay, time to go!” I held Gus tightly into me and he wrapped his legs around my waist. I pulled the mask back on and stood on the other side of the room from the door Ock escaped out of. “Alright, arms, you better still do your thing.” I sprinted at the door and the arms extended in front of me, ripping the door off its hinges. I dived headfirst into the onslaught of river water flowing into the lair. I swam as fast as I could towards the surface but the arms were doing most of the propelling for me. A soft “boom” echoed throughout the river as the lair self-destructed behind Gus and I. I swam as fast as I could, trying to be stronger than the gallons of water flooding downwards to fill the open space left by the lair. Soon we reached the top of the river and I gasped for air.

“Gus? Gus!” I checked to make sure that he was breathing. He was. Just barely, but still. I looked around us to make sure that no police had spotted us emerging from the water. When I saw that they were at least a mile away upriver from us searching the water for bodies, I swam Gus and I towards the riverside park lining the West Side of Manhattan. I pulled us out of the water and set Gus down carefully in a grass bed of the park. The sun was fully risen now, but it was still early and not many joggers or bikers were coming through the park. Gus stirred in my arms and slowly tried to push himself upright.

“Hey, hey, hey, take it slow. Just lie down against me for a while. Get your strength back.” He leaned back into my body and held my arms close against him.

“Hey...” His raspy voice was just barely loud enough for me to hear.

“What’s up?” I leaned down and positioned my ear close to his mouth so he wouldn’t have to put as much effort into speaking.

“Point taken. You can scare me. But no more throwing me off buildings.” I laughed and he managed to make a smile.

“It’s okay now. I got you.” Gus clenched his chest suddenly and for a moment his veins turned bright blue and you could see them through his skin. But in a second, it was all gone. “Must be that serum kicking in. You’re okay.” Gus pulled my head towards his and he kissed me. “Wow, not even throwing you off a building can stop you from wanting to kiss me!” I teased. Gus laughed weakly but it turned into a cough. I held him tight as he coughed the remaining fluid out of his system.

“I am not surprised whatsoever to find you two here.” We both looked up and saw Iron Man floating above both of us. “Come on, let’s get you out of here before the cops find you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come visit me on Tumblr!! https://www.tumblr.com/blog/twosidedspidermanbitch
> 
> I love feedback from you guys so let me know what you think about it and the direction it’s going! I have the next chapter ready and I’ll be publishing it in a day or two!


	20. Taking Flight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back to Gus’ POV!!!

Peter was snoring lightly as he slumped into the side of my body, his head leaning on my shoulder. He fell asleep while holding my hand so his limp hand was still resting in mine. I was being as still as possible, trying not to disturb him from his deep slumber, but every muscle in my body was cramping from trying to be still for the past 7 hours of our 7 and a half hour flight.

“Hello, folks. This is your captain speaking. We will be beginning our descent into Paris so please return your seats to their upright positions and stow your belongings and tray tables.” The same message was repeated in French. I felt Peter stir.

“Whutzzitnow?” His raspy and sleepy voice asked. He slowly lifted himself off my shoulder and sat upright, rubbing the crust out of his eyes and cracking his neck.

“FINALLY! Oh my god I never thought you would wake up!” I proceeded to go through my body, stretching every muscle in it.

“How long was I out?”

“Literally we boarded the plane and you zonked out onto me. It was cute at first but when I realized about an hour in that I wouldn’t be able to move or else you would wake up I knew I was screwed.”

“Why didn’t you just move? I would have fallen right back asleep!”

“Are you kidding me? You literally haven’t slept since before the whole Doctor Octopus thing. I wasn’t about to be the boyfriend that prevents you from getting sleep after being awake for 48 hours!” After Iron Man found both of us by the river, he brought us back to Avengers mansion and decided that we both needed to lay low for a while so he could clean up after us and let all the news blow over. We had a choice between living in the Avengers Compound for two weeks or staying abroad. We were able to twist his arm into funding a vacation to Europe for the two of us. First stop: Paris.

“You’re the best.” Peter said, blearily. He leaned in for a kiss and I gave him a little peck. I was pulling away when he grabbed the back of my head and pulled me in closer for another peck. And another. And another. Before long the pecks involved a lot more tongue.

“Ahem.” We broke away from each other suddenly and turned upwards to see our flight attendant standing over us, trying to act professional. “Sorry to, um, break things up between you two, but I just need to take your meal tray there,” she said as she gestured to the tray where my complimentary first class lunch was served to me.

“Oh of course! I’m so sorry! For this and for... that.” I said as I handed her the tray. She blushed and smiled at us.

“I’ll close off your seats with a curtain for the remaining duration of the flight.” We both smiled at her and then at each other as she pulled the curtain shut, closing us off from the rest of the cabin. Peter and I resumed what we were doing.

“I know we just went through, like... the most... but getting to travel first class on Tony Stark’s budget is one of the greatest things in the world.” I said as I interrupted our make out sesh.

“I know! My mind was blown when I went to Germany.”

“Oh my god, I totally forgot that you like fought half of the Avengers.”

“Some might say I was pretty close to beating Cap but, y’know, don’t really want to brag...” Peter said jokingly as he stuck his nose up in the air.

“Shut up, you! Like you could even come close to beating him! Wait... was he as hot in person as he looks on TV and stuff?”

“Gus...” Peter clenched my leg for dramatic effect, “you can’t even begin to imagine how hot he was in person. At one point he told me that I had heart and I nearly melted.”

“I’m so jealous!”

“What?? You’d rather have Captain America as a boyfriend than Spider-Man?” I rolled my eyes and said,

“If I’d rather have Cap as a boyfriend would I really be so eager to do this?” I reached down under the blanket that was covering his waist and torso. His eyes widened as I slipped my hand into his underwear. He leaned into me and we continued making out. He broke away from my lips (my hand did not break away from what it was doing) as he began to speak.

“If I knew—“ I moved faster and he inhaled sharply.

“What? Cat got your tongue?” I leaned in and kissed him again, nibbling gently on his lip this time.

“If I knew that this is what happens when I asked you if you’d rather date other guys that aren’t me I’d be questioning your loyalty to me a lot more.” I laughed and leaned back into his face as he pushed his pelvis into my hand. Needless to say, a few seconds later when the plane landed and finished its descent, Peter finished too.

“Well that was quite the way to wake up!” Peter said after we cleaned up after ourselves (we were both very grateful for the napkins that our flight attendant forgot to take from my lunch).  
We got to our hotel at around 4PM. Well, not hotel, exactly. More like Tony Stark’s Paris condo.

“Oh. My. God.” Peter and I said simultaneously as we opened the door to our home for the next few days. We were on the bottom floor of a three floor condo complete with a waterfall that stretched from the top of the third floor to the floor of the first. Balconies at each of the floors looked down onto the living room with the waterfall that we just entered into. It had a panoramic view of Paris, just across the street from the Eiffel Tower. A gift basket was sitting on the coffee table in the center of the living room. Peter strolled over to it and read the card sitting at the top of it aloud.

“P + G,  
In this basket you’ll find two credit cards so that you can each have one hooked up directly to my bank account for any spending money you might need on this trip. They’re both going to deactivate the second this trip ends so don’t get any bright ideas. Remember this is so you two can lay low while I deal with your mess, so the number one rule is: NO SPIDER-MAN. Europe has been doing fine with no superheroes before you two came overseas for your little hormonal gay teenage Europe vacation so let the proper authorities deal with whatever happens while you’re here. Speaking of hormonal gay teenagers, you’ll also find a lot of condoms and lube and stuff in this basket. I’m not dumb, I know what teenagers do when they’re left home alone, I was left home alone for all of my childhood and look at how unhealthy my relationship to sex is now. Just be safe.  
-TS”

Peter picked up a box of condoms and a bottle of lube from the basket and I burst out laughing.

“Don’t laugh! This is my mentor! I have never felt more uncomfortable in my entire life!” He put the box and bottle he was holding down and preceded to take at least a dozen more of each out of the basket. “Oh my god there’s enough here for us to have sex at least a dozen times a day on this trip, who does he think we are?!”

We continued our tour throughout the apartment. We had our pick between five bedrooms but ended up going with the smallest one because it had direct access to a sauna. It was a very close decision between that and the bedroom with the hologram TV. Peter ended up making the executive decision on the sauna room though because it had the most important feature in his point of view: the best bed to jump on. We spent at least 30 minutes with him jumping on ever bed repeatedly until he finally was able to decide on the sauna bedroom. When we finally got all of our suitcases moved in and unpacked, Peter laid down on the bed face-first.

“No! Number one cardinal rule of vacationing! Fight the jet lag! I’m not gonna let either of us sleep until at least midnight so we can get adjusted.”

“But that’s in like 6 hoursssssss. Pleaseeeeee can I take a nap?” Peter gave me puppy dog eyes.

“You can’t do that! That’s cheating! I always fall for your puppy dog eyes!” He grinned ear to ear.

“I know you do, it’s more powerful than any of my spider-powers.” I crawled on top of him, gently kissing his neck.

“Well I can’t see your puppy dog eyes when I’m this close to you so I win.”  
He rolled over and looked at me.

“But when I’m facing you...”

“Nope!” I leaned in and made out with him. “Too close.”

“Fine...” he said as he made out with me in return. Peter rolled me onto my back as he straddled over me and continued making out with me. I could feel something growing in his pants as he grinded his hips against my dick. “You know...” Peter reached into his back pocket as he continued talking. “as terrible and uncomfortable as that gift basket from Mr. Stark was it’s not the worst idea in the world...”

“What isn’t?” Peter pulled one of the condoms out of his back pocket.

“Having sex dozens a time a day on this trip.” He grinned flirtatiously and rubbed my pants with his other hand. I laughed nervously. “What’s wrong?” Peter stopped rubbing and put the condom to the side as he rolled off of me.

“I don’t know...” A thin layer of sweat covered my body. Peter held my hand.

“What’s wrong? You can tell me, it’s okay.” He gave my hand a squeeze.

“I don’t know if I’m... ready.”

“Oh.”

“I’m sorry I just—“

“No don’t say sorry! It’s okay! Don’t worry about it!”

“But you were so excited to—“

“Shut up! Stop right there! If you don’t want to that’s fine. I can fuck your brains out (or vice versa) (we can talk about this later) anytime you want to! I just want you to be happy.” He threw the condom across the room. I smiled and he smiled back.

“Hey it doesn’t mean I want to be entirely celibate or anything.”

“What does that mean...” Peter smiled teasingly and raised his eyebrows.

“Well I think you owe me back from the plane...”

“Oh really?” He leaned in and crawled on top of me again. I felt his hands undoing my pants. I pulled him towards me and we began to make out as we slipped my pants and underwear off. He reached down to where my underwear used to be before I grabbed his hand and stopped him. “What?” He looked up at me. God, he was so cute when he was concerned. I placed my hands on the top of his head and pushed his whole body gently down. He realized what was happening and slid his body downwards until his head was directly below my waist. I took my shirt off and he pulled his off, too. He gently kissed my inner thighs as he took off the rest of his clothes before he put me inside his mouth. I gasped as he bobbed his head up and down. He stopped for a moment, feeling my body tense up with pleasure.

“Am I doing it right?” He was breathing heavily.

“You’re doing it more than just right.” He smiled and eagerly went back to it.

About 15 minutes later, we were lying next to each other, staring at the ceiling. Both of us were covered in sweat (and more) and were breathing heavily.

“Hey.” Peter broke the silence.

“What?” I turned my head to face him.

“I know this is a crazy idea but what if we actually got out of bed and explored Paris for a little bit.”

“I’m not sure it’ll be as fun as what we just did but it’s not a half bad idea.” I said jokingly.

He smiled before saying, “Let’s grab some dinner. But don’t worry... I have some more ideas for when we get home.”

He winked at me, making my stomach to summersaults. I grinned ear to ear. “I’ll go grab some water for us then we can get dressed.”

“Good idea.” He gave me a peck before walking out of the room, his bubble butt bouncing as he walked away. I stood up and walked to the bathroom. I leaned over the sink and splashed some water on my face, cooling myself off after all of the fun Peter and I just had. I looked up at myself in the mirror when suddenly all of the veins in my body became visible on my skin and they were all bright blue. It only lasted a second before they faded. Could I have been imagining it? Maybe. But anyways, I got the serum a little over a day ago. It’s probably just what Peter said earlier, it’s still being introduced into my system, right?

“Gus, come on and get dressed I’m almost ready to go!”

“Coming!”

“Without me?” Peter teased. I laughed at his well-executed sexual pun.

I was happy. I was alive. And I was about to start the best two weeks of my life. What could go wrong?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m gonna try to do some more end notes at the end of chapters to give some insight on the making-of and stuff!
> 
> I’m really excited about this next little chunk of the fic cause I feel like Peter and Gus haven’t been given much time to just relax and be happy together (or get to do anything sexual and fun with each other) so things are going to slow down for a bit but be really cute. I love getting feedback from any of my readers so let me know what you think of it in the comments!
> 
> Check out my tumblr too if you want:  
> https://www.tumblr.com/blog/twosidedspidermanbitch


	21. The City of Love

“Oh my god I feel like I’m gonna throw up, I can’t have another bite,” Peter said as he swallowed a bite of his ice cream. He thrust the sugar cone filled with the thick custard-like French vanilla ice cream towards me. I took it happily before noticing teeth marks in it.

“Did you... bite into this??”

“Yes...” Peter eyed me, not fully understanding the monstrosity he just committed against ice cream.

“You bite into your ice cream?!”

“Uh... yeah? Do you not?”

“No one does! Only freaks do!”

“Well I guess I’m a freak then...” Peter whispered in my ear as he slipped his hand down my underwear and squeezed my bare ass.

“Peter!” I jerked away from him so that his hand slipped out of my pants. “We’re in public!”

“Oh, please. Look around!” We were walking along an empty street in the Marais District of Paris. It had just rained and the only things that could be seen on the street were the glittering reflections of the yellow-orange streetlamps on the cobblestones and us. It was our last night in Paris. We were flying out to Spain the next morning to continue our European getaway.

“But seriously, doesn’t it hurt your teeth at all just biting straight into ice cream?” I said as I licked over Peter’s bite marks in the ice cream.

“Not really, is it supposed to?” I rolled my eyes. “What?! What did I do?!”

“Nothing! It’s that stupid spider bite! First it gives you superpowers, then it gives you abs, and now it gives you the coveted ability of being able to bite directly into ice cream! It’s ridiculous!”

“There is one thing the spider bite isn’t responsible for...” Peter was turning his sexy voice on. I could always tell when he was about to make a scandalous little comment or make a pass at me whenever he used this voice. Peter stepped in front of me and prevented me from walking any further. Peter was a solid three inches or so shorter than me but when he was in the mood to be sexy, it felt like he had complete and total control over me.

“And what’s that?” I responded as I stepped into him, pressing our bodies close to each other. He craned his head up and whispered,

“My ability to bite you...” He nibbled on the sore spot on my left shoulder where he bit into me last night after a particularly wild night spent back at Tony Stark’s Paris apartment. I winced in a combination of pain and pleasure as I remembered everything that had happened the night before. Peter could feel my slight discomfort and turned his gentle gnawing into light kisses that traced up my shoulder and collar bone to my neck. I was getting hard and fast. Peter could tell. He jerked away from me suddenly and started strutting away.

“Oh, well, enough of that! Come on! Lovely night for a walk!” He was teasing me and leading me on, leaving me wanting more.

“Asshole!” I shouted out after him as I jogged forward to catch up with him. Suddenly, the ground moved out from underneath me and I was falling face-first into the cobblestone. My shoe must have slipped as I jogged along the wet street.

“Gus! Are you okay?” Peter appeared over me. He was helping me up and holding me close.

“Yeah I think I’m fine...” I touched my hand to my nose and forehead where it was stinging and was greeted with the warm sticky feeling of blood. Peter looked horrified. “Oh, come on. It’s not that bad, just help me up. I’m fine.” Peter quickly slipped his hand into his back pocket and took out his web shooters.

“Peter! No Spider-Man! That’s the whole point of this trip, remember?”

“Shut up! This is for you, dummy.” He quickly spun a web bandana to tie around my forehead to stop the bleeding there and a small web patch to apply to the cut on my nose. I winced as he applied it. “Aw it looks like it might be broken, I’m sorry hon.” I was taken aback for a moment. Peter had never called me by a nickname like ‘hon’ before.

“Hon?” I asked. Peter blushed.

“I don’t know, it just sort of slipped out. Is it super cheesy?” I laughed.

“No, it’s cute.” I gave him a kiss on the cheek, leaving a little mark of blood from where my nose brushed against his face.

“It still doesn’t beat my nickname for you, though.” Peter looked confused.

“You forgot?! Penis Parker!”

“UGH!!!!” Peter groaned and stood up and away from me. “I completely forgot about that!”

“Hey, now it has a whole new meaning.” Peter looked confused again.

“Considering how big your penis really is I feel like your name should just be an homage to that...” Peter blushed for a moment but put his sexy voice back on.

“Fine, I forgive you. You can call me that.” I giggled and he sat back down next to me. His hair was curling up with all the moisture in the air and falling over his forehead. He was so freaking cute.

“Hey, do you think you wanna show Penis Parker just how much you love his penis?” He leaned into me and started sucking gently on my neck. I shoved him away playfully.

“Are you kidding me?! It’s because you didn’t give my penis any attention a second ago that I fell and hurt myself! In what world are you the one that’s gonna be getting the penis attention right now??”

“Alright! Alright! You’ll get the penis attention tonight! Now let’s get home and give the city of love a night to remember...” I groaned as I got up slowly. “Does it hurt when you walk?” Peter said, concerned.

“No, it’s not that just... it’s such a long way back home walking.”

“Hey, who said anything about walking?”

“Oh, I guess you’re right. Did Tony give us a number or anything for a car—“ I was interrupted as Peter swooped me into the air and we swung away into the night sky. “PETER! NO! SPIDER! MAN!”

“Who said anything about no swinging through Paris, though? Relax! Enjoy the ride.” I relaxed into him and wrapped my arms around him. The cool wind whipped around us as I reached one of my hands down and placed it gently on his stomach. “Uh... what are you doing?” Peter asked as I laughed to myself.

“Your abs look really hot when you’re swinging around so I thought I’d just feel them instead.” I began gently making out with his neck as he swang. I looked down at his pants and he was very obviously aroused. “Oh, look who’s hard now? Guess I’ll just stop then...” Peter groaned in sexual frustration then cried out,

“I’m sorry! I’ll never leave you hanging if you have a boner ever again, I promise!”

“Thank you! See, that’s all I wanted?” I wrapped both of my arms around him again and rested my head on his shoulder. Peter spoke again.

“Wait... are you really not gonna, you know...” Peter gestures down to his boner as he swung.

“Are you kidding me? I’m still next in line for the penis attention, wait your turn!”

“You’re impossible!” We both laughed and I took in the view around us. I noticed that we swung right by our apartment.

“Wait, Peter, didn’t we just—“

“Shh. Quick pit stop. Close your eyes.” I closed my eyes tightly and held onto Peter, inhaling deeply against the skin of his neck. He smelled like vanilla. But like sweaty vanilla. And a bit manly, too. Like sweaty, manly, vanilla.

“Open your eyes.” We came to a stop.

“Place your feet down very carefully.”  
I lowered my feet down and opened my eyes. We were looking out over all of Paris from above. On top of the Eiffel Tower.

“Okay, I’m just gonna say it. As cute and romantic and beautiful as this is, I can’t help but get a bit scared thinking about the last time you took me to the top of a needle of a really tall building in the last city we were in...”

“Okay, fair, but this time I’m not letting go.” Peter wrapped his arms around me and held on tight. He was craning his neck upwards to rest his head on my shoulder.

“Shortie.” I teased.

“Hey, I could throw you off again.” We both laughed. I leaned into him and he leaned into me. I stood there, looking out over the city of love with the man I love. The man I love. I let it sink in for a moment. I loved him. I really did.

“ _ **I LOVE YOU!**_ ” Peter and I blurted it out on the top of our lungs at the same time. I leaned over my shoulder and looked at him as he looked at me.

“I love you!” I said it again. Peter and I were both laughing. I think there may have been tears in our eyes. Tears or rain. Who knew.

“That’s funny, cause I love you!” Peter said back to me. I laughed. I carefully turned around to him and pulled his face in and kissed him. It wasn’t a sexual kiss. Or a small kiss. Or a friendly kiss. It was a love kiss. A giant, passionate, slobbery, wet (probably because it started pouring rain again by this point. Also spit, though), love kiss. Our hair was matted to our foreheads. Rain was coming down torrentially around us. We leaned our foreheads against each other and touched the tips of our noses together.

“I love you.”

“I love you.”

“I love you.”

“I love you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come visit my Tumblr if you want!
> 
> https://www.tumblr.com/blog/twosidedspidermanbitch


	22. Te Amo

Peter and I were standing in front of about the fifth church we had seen that day. It was our second day in Barcelona. Peter had split each day of our time in Spain into different locations. Day 1: Museums. Day 2: Churches. Day 3: Non-Church Historical Buildings and Architecture. Day 4 (my personal favorite day): The Beach and Boardwalk.

“Okay, all of this stuff is cool, but do we really have to stick to this plan? I don’t know if I can take one more guided tour of a church,” I complained.

“Look, Gus, I get that your tastes are very limited to anything that happened or was created before 1970 but please let me nerd out over this historical stuff.”

“But we had all of Paris! That was so much history!” Peter looked at me, exasperated.

“We both know 80% of our time in Paris was spent in bed and the other 20% was spent going out to eat. Granted, we were very active in bed,” Peter snuck a wink at me as he said this, “but we basically saw the Eiffel Tower and that’s it. Let me just have fun with the history in Spain and once we get to Greece we can just sit in bed on the boat all day and you can stare at me shirtless all you want.”

“Fiiiiiiiiiiiine,” I said in agreement. Any compromise that led to me getting to see Peter shirtless was a good one.

“Here, take a photo of me in front of this for May.” Peter handed me his camera and I got the shot.

“How’s that look?” I said as I handed him his camera back. Peter took a long look at it, then craned his head and squinted, trying to look at it from another angle.

“Oh, come on, it’s not that bad.” I said.

“Uhh... let’s just say you’re a lot better at giving me blowjobs than you are at taking my picture.”

“Asshole!” I exclaimed as I playfully hit his arm and Peter jumped away while laughing.

“I’m just joking! It’s perfect... just like you...” Peter said. I smiled and kissed him, but I had to pull away.

“As much as I love you and love kissing you, it’s way too hot to be within 2 feet of you without air conditioning.”

“Very true,” Peter said as he fanned his stomach by lifting his shirt up and down, giving me quick flashes of his chiseled abs.

“Wow I should make us go to hot places a lot more often.” I said as I eyed his torso. Peter rolled his eyes. “But seriously, is that picture good?”

“Yes! I swear! May will just be happy I’m doing more person-ing than I am superhero-ing.”

“What does she think about this trip, anyways? Does she know about... us?”

“Nononono. You would be with me if I ever told her so you would definitely know if she knew. She just thinks you’re my friend that knows I’m Spider-Man and got tangled up in the whole Doc Ock mess. She’s not too thrilled about me leaving school for two weeks but Tony promised her that we’d be keeping up with school work on the trip and it would be educational.” I laughed when I heard this.

“Yeah, well, if we were focusing on sex-ed then it would be very educational.”

“Shut up! Also, we have to at least pretend that we kept up with school while we were on this trip when we get back.”

“I know, I know. My parents think I got into a special two week trip with Stark Industries as part of a Stark Internship.”

“Ahhhh, the infamous ‘Stark Internship’. I remember using that excuse for everything.”

“Yeah, and Kitty, Liz, Mels, and Sam are all sort of just going along with it. They don’t know that I’m with you, though, don’t worry. I didn’t want them to get suspicious or anything.”

“Thanks.” Peter smiled at me and gave my hand a squeeze as he said this. By now we had started walking through the streets of Barcelona, hand in hand.

“What about your friends? What do they think about it?” I asked Peter.

“I mean, ever since I left Midtown (my old school) they don’t really care about what I’m doing. I still stay in touch with all of my friends from there, though. When I first switched schools I was freaking out to my best friend Ned about how you knew me both as Spider-Man and Peter Parker, but that whole mess is finally beyond us. And MJ is the same old MJ. We FaceTime every so often and stay in touch. She pretends like she doesn’t care that I left but I know she does.”

“Why’d you have to leave Midtown?”

“I got a scholarship into our school and we could use the boost ever since Uncle Ben. Anyways! Where to next?” I could tell the mention of his uncle made Peter a bit uncomfortable, so I went along with his change in conversation.

“Hm... I’m gonna guess what you’re gonna suggest which isssss... yet another boring old church!!”

“Oh my god! You win!!!” Peter replied sarcastically.

“What do I win?? Getting to make the executive decision of us going back to the hotel so we can get naked with each other??”

“Nope! A free trip to an old church!” Peter teased.

“I literally hate you so much right now.”

“Don’t say thaaaaaat. You know you love meeeeee.” I squinted my eyes at him and said,

“Fine. I love you.” Peter laughed to himself and planted a kiss on me before saying,

“Love you too!” We continued walking to our next church destination, taking in the foreign city all around us and stopping for ice cream to please me. Eventually, a question kept popping up in the back of my head.

“Were you ever with anyone? Besides me?” Peter was startled by the question.

“Um... yeah, why?”

“Oo! Tell me about them! Was it a boy or a girl?”

“It was a girl... her name was Liz.”

“Oh my god, like my friend Liz? That’s so weird.” I waited for Peter to continue telling me more about the infamous Liz but he just kept walking. “Come on, I’m not gonna be jealous, just tell me about her!”

“It’s not that! I know you won’t get jealous... it just didn’t end very well.”

“Uh oh. What happened?”

“Well... you remember the whole Vulture thing from a few months ago, right?”

“Yeah... but you brought him down, didn’t you? And no one died or anything, right?”

“No one died but... The Vulture was Liz’s dad.” I stopped dead in my tracks.

“You’re telling me you dated your own nemesis’ daughter??”

“We never really dated! We just went to Homecoming together. I just had like, the biggest crush on her.” I burst out laughing. “It’s not funny!” Peter protested.

“Are you kidding me? Of all the girls to have a crush on you choose The Vulture’s daughter??”

“Okay it’s only a little bit funny!” Peter was cracking a smile. “But, no. She had to move away in the end when he went to prison. It’s not a happy ending.”

“I’m sorry, that sucks. Have you talked to her at all since?”

“No, it didn’t end well between us relationship wise, too. I sort of ran out on her during Homecoming. To fight her dad.”

“Ahhh, the typical ‘Peter Parker is super vague and mysterious and ditches you every 0.5 seconds’. I can relate.”

“Don’t bring up the past, I still feel terrible about that!”

“Aw, it’s fine. Don’t worry, we’re all good now. I love you.” I leaned into Peter and kissed him.

“I love you.” He responded, before kissing me again. The kissing went on for a little too long and soon enough we were making out in the middle of the street. “Okay, to be honest, going back to the hotel room and getting naked sounds pretty darn good right now.” Peter admitted.

“YES! The power of penis always wins!!!” Peter rolled his eyes and said,

“And with that comment alone, you just made me lose all of my desire to get naked with you. Church time!”

I groaned as I followed behind Peter while he skipped ahead towards the church. “Only a few more days of history,” I thought to myself, “only a few more days until we’re in Greece with nothing but a boat, the sun, and each other.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check out my Tumblr if you want!
> 
> https://www.tumblr.com/blog/twosidedspidermanbitch


	23. Our Last Summer

“Now _there_ we go!” I pulled on the rope as hard as I could and the 30 foot tall sail lurched into the sky above us. The wind immediately caught onto it and out boat began sailing through the water.

“Oh my god, you actually did it.” Peter remarked.

“Actually?? Did you think I didn’t know how to sail?”

“It’s not that I thought you didn’t know how to sail it’s just... yeah no I totally thought we were gonna be stranded out here.”

“Just because I don’t have spider powers doesn’t mean I don’t know how to do anything!” I protested.

“Is there anything I can do to help though?”

“No, thank you very much! I’m more than capable of handling our transport while we’re out on the open water. I swear, the second we step away from tall buildings for one day and I’m in charge of getting us around, you’re just itching to take control of how to do everything again. Just sit back and let me take care of it.” Peter got up from where he was laying down on a towel and walked towards me.

“Mm, a man in charge. I like the sound of that...” Peter said as he stood behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. He slipped his hand under the front waistband of my underpants. I melted into him as he began fondling me. “I want you to take charge of me...” Peter whispered into my ear.

“Mmmmwait no! Go sit down! I’m the only one here that knows how to sail and I’m not crashing Tony Stark’s billion dollar sailboat.”

“Fiiiiiiine. Where are you sailing us anyways?”

“On the other side of the island there’s supposed to be this really nice quiet and secluded cove. I double checked with some people on the island before we arrived and made sure that no one else would anchor there while we were there (name dropping Tony Stark helped with that). But anyways I thought it could be fun to have a little bit of privacy...”

“I like the way you think, Gus Myers!” Peter said as he slapped my butt and walked to the front of the boat. I looked out on the bright blue Grecian water around me as I gently sailed us around the island. We had landed on the island just that morning and drove immediately over to the docks to board our second-to-last European destination: Tony Stark’s sailboat permanently docked on a beautiful Greek island.  
When we finally got to the cove, I took the sail down and dropped the anchor.

“Are we here?!” Peter asked excitedly.

“You know it!”

“Whooooooo!!” Peter leapt up from his seat and tore his shirt off. I know that I had been admiring his abs since before I even knew that Peter was Spider-Man but, man, it never got old to see Peter’s ripped body in front of me. Peter paused for a moment and looked at me. “Wait, this cove is secluded... as in no one else is here, right?”

“Yeah...” I replied.

“Whoooo!!” Peter tore his shorts and underpants off so he was fully naked standing in front of me. “Take off your clothes and jump in the water with me or I’m gonna throw you in with your clothes on!” Peter shouted at me. I laughed and succumbed to Peter’s skinny dipping fantasy, taking off all of my clothes. He grabbed my hand and pulled me to the edge of the boat. “Okay, on the count of three... one... two... three!” I leapt into the air and felt my hand break apart from Peter’s. I looked behind me and for a split second before being submerged in the clear blue water I saw Peter laughing to himself on the deck of boat. The water soon engulfed me. It was surprisingly warm. The small bubbles from my jump tickled my body as they glided up my skin towards the surface of the water. I scooped the water above my head down to my sides and my head broke out into the open air.

“ASSHOLE!” I screamed at Peter.

“Hey, you’re the one that has the good view now, what are you complaining about?” Peter said as thrust his hips forward, proudly presenting his whole package for me and making clear what he meant by ‘good view’.

“Just get in the water!” I called out.

“Fiiiiine.” Peter backed up.

“CANNONBAAAAAAALL!!” He sprinted off the deck and leapt into the air. His spider powers sent him soaring at least 30 feet into the air. I swam frantically away from where he was gonna splash down. He landed and a glorious 10 foot tall wave cascaded down onto me. Peter’s little head bobbed up out of the water, grinning happily.

“Wow. You are such a show off.” I said, referring to his power-enhanced cannonball. 

“Oh come on, don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy the little show. Anyways, you’re the one that always talks about how much you love ‘Penis Parker’s big penis’, why are you complaining?” Peter replied.

“I’m talking about the cannonball!! I swear sometimes the only thing you have on your mind is penises!” Peter swam closer to me as he said,

“Just one penis in particular...” I felt Peter grab my dick underneath the water’s surface. He wrapped his legs around me and hugged me like a koala while I treaded water, keeping us both afloat. I noticed Peter open his mouth, then close it hesitantly.

“What?” I asked.

“Hm?” Peter responded.

“Come on, I can tell something’s on your mind, what is it?”

“Well, I don’t wanna be pressuring you or anything, but have you thought at all about...” Peter trailed off, but I could guess what he was talking about. I decided I would finish his question for him.

“Having sex?” Peter smiled shyly and nodded. “Well, I have. And, honestly, I don’t know, I just don’t feel ready. And it’s not like I’m not comfortable being that intimate with you, I love you, there’s no one else I’d rather do it with.”

“I love you, too,” Peter interrupted me. I smiled and kissed him, the salt from the water overpowering the taste of Peter. I continued.

“But I just don’t know if I’m ready, personally. Honestly, it’s just scary how all of it... happens... and when it does happen I want to want it to happen, does that make sense?” Peter looked confused. “Like... I’m happy now with everything we’re doing together, sexually, I mean. Very happy. Like I can’t even begin to express how much fun I’ve had this trip just endlessly— well, you know.” Peter smiled and gave my butt a squeeze underwater. “And it’s like, I’m so happy with how it is now, and the idea of actually like going for it and doing the full penetrative sex thing scares me so much, it’s sort of like, why do it? Does that make sense?”

“Yeah. And I’m sorry if it felt like I was pushing you to do anything, I didn’t mean to make you feel pressured.”

“Don’t worry, you didn’t.” Peter hugged me closer and I felt his legs readjust, pushing his body further up my own. He leaned his head on my shoulder and rested his cheek there so that he was facing my neck.

“I’m sorry I’m asking so much I just really wanna put my penis inside of youuuuu.” Peter said in a playfully pouty but cute voice.

“Awwww” I said, patting his back as if he were a toddler that didn’t get his way.

“This will have to do instead!” I suddenly placed both my hands on his head and plunged him underwater. I laughed to myself for a moment before a hand grabbed my ankle, pulling me down with it. I let myself be pulled down and opened my eyes in the crystal clear ocean water. It was blurry looking through the salt water, but I could see Peter keeping himself submerged below me, smiling. I pushed the water around me above my head so that I would stay submerged with him as well. He grabbed my hand and tugged me towards him slightly. We embraced each other under the water and he mouthed something to me.

“ _I love you_.”

I leaned in and gave him an underwater kiss. By the time we broke apart from each other for air, our heads were bobbing above the water. Peter’s hair was matted to his forehead in dark, heavy curls. I pulled him close to me and kissed him passionately. He broke apart from me for a second.

“What do you say we continue this on board, Captain?” I giggled as he kissed the base of my neck, working up it to my ear where he nibbled on my ear lobe. I reached down to Peter’s waist and my hand was greeted by his hard dick. I leaned into his ear and whispered,

“We’d better get on board. I can think of a few things I wanna do right now that would be difficult to do in water...” Peter and I broke apart quickly and swam towards the boat. “Oh shit!” I exclaimed.

“What’s up?” Peter asked.

“I forgot to let the ladder down for us to climb back up.” Peter looked at me with a deadpan face.

“Gus. Are you forgetting, like, everything about me right now?” Before I knew it Peter was scampering up the side of the boat, sticking to the wet, slippery sides. He flipped over the edge and moments later the ladder dropped down into the water in front of me. “All aboard!” Peter shouted.

I scurried up the ladder and, the second I neared the top, Peter forcefully grabbed my shoulders and flung me over the side of the ship and directly into his arms. He gently laid me down on a towel then immediately lay down on top of me so that his head was facing the direction that my feet were. I understood what he was attempting to do and readjusted my body so that we both had easy access to each other’s dicks. I grabbed his firmly and took it into my mouth eagerly. I could feel his body melt above mine with pleasure. I stopped momentarily.

“I’m not gonna be the only one doing it! Get to it!” I said as I gave his butt a little slap and he got to work on me. Peter stopped again and lifted himself off of me. “What is it?” I asked. Peter laughed before saying, 

“You’re very... salty, ‘cause of the ocean. I feel like I need some water.” We were both laughing now.  
“Oh, you’ll be getting something hydrating very soon if you keep at it.” I grabbed his buttcheeks and pushed his waist and dick back into my mouth. Peter lowered himself back down onto me and, a few swivels and bobs of his head later, he was beyond hydrated.  
As the sun set later in the day, a cool breeze endlessly washed over the boat. Peter had put on his swim trunks and an open button-down shirt while I threw on a cozy sweater and some gym shorts. We were waiting for our frozen pizza dinner to heat up in the oven. I was sitting up against the side of the boat’s hull and Peter was leaning against me. My hands were running through and playing with his curly, salty, sun-dried hair as his head rested against my chest.

“We’re having such a Mamma Mia! moment right now.” Peter said softly. I smiled, imagining Peter and I as star-crossed lovers living our fantasies out on a Greek island and expressing our love through ABBA songs. Well, most of that was true. Just no ABBA, unfortunately.

“How do you always know so much about movies?” I asked.

“My Uncle Ben,” Peter replied. I immediately felt bad for asking. I knew that his Uncle’s death was a touchy subject for him. “He would always watch his favorite movies with me and take me to the theatre to go see new ones. Mamma Mia! was always one of our favorites.” I hugged him close and gave him a little squeeze, just a small message telling him that I was there for him. “I think he would’ve liked you.”

“Really?” I responded.

“Yeah. He would’ve thought you were really funny. I wish...” I could hear Peter choking up as he spoke. “I wish he could still be here today to meet you.” A few tears were rolling down his cheeks. I wiped them away with my hand and kissed his head gently. “Sometimes I think that if he were still around... I’d be out. Like I would have told him and Aunt May about being bi by now. And we’d all be a lot happier.” Peter paused. He was really crying now.

“It’s okay. I’m here for you.” I whispered in his ear.

“I just hope he’s proud of me.” Peter said between sobs.

“There isn’t a person in this world who’s prouder of someone than Uncle Ben is of you right now, I’m sure of it.” Peter turned to me and smiled, sniffling away the runny nose that the crying gave him. He burrowed his head into my chest and wrapped his arms around me

“I love you.” He said.

“I love you, too.” I responded as I kissed his head. I suddenly heard a faint melody coming from Peter. I could feel the vibrations in his back as he hummed. I lifted him off of me and he looked up at me smiling while humming a tune. It was familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. Then he started singing.

> I can still recall our last summer  
> I still see it all  
> Walks along the Seine, laughing in the rain  
> Our last summer  
> Memories that remain...

He was singing “Our Last Summer” from Mamma Mia!.

“It was always Uncle Ben’s favorite.” He said softly before the crying returned. I continued where he left off for him.

>   
> We made our way along the river...

Peter looked at me, smiling through the tears, then joined me.

>   
> And we sat down in the grass  
> By the Eiffel Tower...

We laughed and kissed each other as we realized the parallels to our own trip now.

> I was so happy we had met  
> It was the age of no regret  
> Oh _yes_!

  
We both emphasized the “yes!” and laughed to each other. We lay our bodies down along the boat, giggling.

“I’ll never forget this summer with you here. Well, not summer. More like mid fall-semester break?” I questioned myself. Peter nodded, reassuring me.

“I’ll never forget it either,” Peter said, “I love you.”

“I love you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed the heavily Mamma Mia! inspired chapter. I love that movie so much so I thought it would be fun to give them a little Mamma Mia! moment.
> 
> The idea of Peter’s love and references to all these movies (which can be seen not only in this fic but also in the MCU movies) being a connection to Uncle Ben for Peter came from a Tumblr post I saw about it. I’m not sure who posted it but I love that idea and thought it would be cool to implement it into my fic, but I take no credit for it at all.
> 
> Check out my tumblr if you want!  
> https://www.tumblr.com/blog/twosidedspidermanbitch


	24. A Night to Remember

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a POV switch in the middle of the chapter! I marked it but make sure you see it as you read!

“Now _this_ is what I’m talking about!” Peter exclaimed as our waitress laid down a large, authentically Italian, margarita pizza. Peter leaned into it and inhaled the scent of the warm cheese, tomato sauce, and fresh basil.

“Enjoy, signor…” Our waitress said flirtatiously as she winked at Peter.

“Oh, my god. She totally just flirted with you.” I said.

“What?” Peter was too focused on the pizza to notice what just happened, “No she didn’t!”

“Yes, she totally just did! Did you not see her _wink_ at you? And what was with that whole ‘signor’ thing??” Peter started laughing as I got worked up.

“You’re jealous, aren’t you?” 

“ _What?!_ No I am _not_ ‘jealous’” I said, mocking Peter’s voice, “I’m just… protective.”

“Sooooo… you’re jealous?” Peter was enjoying every second of his boyfriend getting jealous and overly protective when someone else flirted with him.

“Shut up!”

“No! I think it’s cute, don’t worry.” Peter said as he tried to cool me down.

“It’s just like—“

“Oh my god you’re so jealous.” Peter interrupted.

“Shh! Let me speak! It’s like I love you so much it makes me angry seeing anyone else flirting with you cause you’re mine. In a totally non-creepy way.”  
“Awwwwww look at my cutie jealous boyfriend. Now get over it because I wanna eat this pizza.” Peter said as he lifted a slice up off the tray and onto his plate, long strands of stretchy cheese dangling off of the side of his plate. I took a slice myself and sunk my teeth into it.

“Oh my god, this is the most delicious thing I’ve ever tasted.” I said as I stuffed the pizza into my mouth. Peter said something in response but it was inaudible as he engulfed his slice. No words were spoken for the next few minutes as we both guzzled pizza down our throats. When we both got our fill (and the pizza tray was empty) I reached my hand across the table and placed it on Peter’s.

“I’m sad our trip together is coming to an end.” I remarked. It was our final night in Rome and our final night on our trip to Europe altogether. We had been gone for almost two weeks now and it was about time we returned to the real world again. “I’ve had the best time with you.”

“Me too,” Peter said in response, “I wish it could stay this way forever.”

“Oh, don’t lie to me. You’re my boyfriend, Peter Parker, but I know that as much as you’ve loved this trip you’re just itching to get back into that spider-suit and swing between the buildings of New York City again.” Peter laughed and gazed into my eyes, smiling and blushing.

“You know me so well. I love you so much.” He said. I knew we had been together for a while now but I still felt butterflies in my stomach every single time I realized that we were together. I would do anything for Peter. I would do anything _with_ Peter. I felt like whenever I was around him all of my fears about the world just melted away and I knew that he would keep me happy and safe. I loved him more than anything. Suddenly, I felt an indescribable urge to say something crazy.

“I WANT TO HAVE SEX WITH YOU!” I blurted it out in the middle of the restaurant. Peter’s eyes went wide and his face dropped in shock. Thankfully, most of the people around us didn’t understand a word of English and were just shocked by my sudden shouting of random words, but we still got a few amused glances from fellow English speakers around us.

“I’m sorry, _what?_ ” Peter said in a hushed whisper. I dropped down to his volume level.

“I want to have sex with you!”

“Wha— Bu— Why?” Peter stammered out.

“Because you’re really hot and you’re my boyfriend and I love you and I want you to stick your penis inside of me! Why else?”

“But you said you weren’t ready just a few days ago, what changed?”

“I don’t know! I honestly have no idea! I just had a moment right now where I just knew that no matter what, you would never do anything to hurt me and that you love me and I love you and having sex with you would be super hot so let’s just do it! Let’s just have sex!”

“Gus, I don’t want to pressure you into doing anything. Really, we don’t have to have sex if you don’t want to. I don’t care, honestly.”

“Listen…” I grabbed his other hand that was resting in his lap and forcibly pulled it towards myself under the table, tugging his whole body awkwardly downwards. I pressed his hand against my pants before continuing, “I have a _massive_ boner right now and the only thing in the world that I want to do is to go back to Iron Man’s private Roman villa and have you _fuck_ my brains out. I have no clue how it will feel, or how it will happen, and it will probably hurt, but it will also probably be super duper hot. And, knowing you, your dick is probably popping out of your pants right now, so let’s leave some money on the table, give them an absurdly large tip for making a pizza that made me want to have sex with you, and go back home and have sex.” Without saying a word, Peter slammed a wad of cash onto the table and pulled me out of my chair. We both suspiciously placed our hands in front of our noticeable erections as we fast-walked out of the restaurant and straight into a cab.

The drive back to the villa was unbearable. We knew that if we even touched our hands together we wouldn’t be able to prevent ourselves from tearing each other’s clothes right off so we sat as far apart from one another as we could. At one point, I felt Peter’s hand creep up my arm and eventually make its way to the back of my head, where he playfully tugged at my hair. I pushed my head into his hand. I was biting my lip and I could see Peter was millimeters away from rubbing his own dick. I widened my eyes at him and then looked down at his hand, reminding him that we were in the backseat of a cab. He reluctantly put the hand under his legs so it wouldn’t be able to creep out again. There was nothing more I wanted to do in that moment than wrap my naked body around Peter’s. I had never been hornier in my entire life.

The cab eventually came to a stop outside the villa and Peter threw money at the taxi driver (an amount that was probably about seven times what we owed him). We sprinted into the house and up the stairs into the bedroom. The second the door opened, I leapt and flung myself onto the bed. I rolled over and propped myself up, looking at Peter. He was standing in the doorway, undoing the top few buttons of his shirt and then undoing his belt.

“Why the _fuck_ are you doing anything that isn’t furiously making love to me right now?” I demanded. Peter paused, then walked into the room slowly. He turned the light switch off and in the darkness I heard his voice emerge.

“Close your eyes.” Peter said in a sexy and dominating voice.

“Peter, it’s already pitch black, I don’t think I need to—“

“Shh, I’m trying to make a cute romantic moment here. Just close your eyes.” Peter said, breaking character. I did what he said and about a minute later he spoke again, saying, “You can open your eyes now.”

When I opened my eyes, I was greeted by the sight of a bedroom entirely lit by candles. The warm glow lit up the entire room and embraced everything in a romantic light.

“I thought it might be nice to take our time with it. Make it a full moment.” Peter said.

“Peter, it’s perfect.” I said softly. He laughed in response. “What?” I asked.

“You are the most predictable romantic I’ve met in my entire life. I knew you would love this.” I laughed as Peter slowly climbed onto the bed and gently rested his body down on top of mine. He leaned in towards me and the second our lips touched, I couldn’t help but furiously make out with him. I subconsciously began fumbling with his shirt buttons. Peter pulled away and grabbed both of my wrists, moving my hands away from his shirt and pressing them into the mattress above my head.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Taking it slow, remember?” He answered. I blushed in response, realizing that I nearly tore his shirt apart. “But, if you wanted this off, you could have just asked.” Peter said as he ripped his shirt off in one swift motion, sending buttons flying around the room. I was greeted by his ripped body, glistening with sweat. His chest was heaving as he breathed heavily. He took ahold of my hands again and kept them above my head as he slowly and passionately made out with my neck. The hickeys he was making were so deep that they would be there for the next coming weeks, but I didn’t care. I just wanted Peter. All of him.

“I love you.” I moaned. This wasn’t an act of pure lust, or sex, or passion. Yes, it was all of those things, but mostly, it was love. “I love you so much.”

“I love you, Gus Myers.” Peter said as he traced my collarbone with kisses. He was kissing every inch of my body, making it known that he loved every inch of me through his actions. I don’t even know when it happened by my shirt was off and Peter was making his way down my stomach towards my waistband.

“Peter, please.” I gasped out.

“What is it?” He looked up from my stomach with his big, brown eyes.

“Let’s just do it. Now. I want you. It’s all I want.” I responded. Peter lifted himself off of me and reached towards the drawer of the bedside table. He opened it up and seductively pulled out a condom and a small bottle of lube.

“I honestly had no clue if this would be in here. I just guessed Mr. Stark put some here.” He said as he sat upright while straddling me. I laughed, but every second that Peter didn’t have his lips on me hurt. I needed him. I needed him to embrace me and hold me and make love to me. He slowly and teasingly tore the condom package open with his mouth. As he took it out of its package, I followed a bead of sweat with my eyes as it rolled down his neck and chest. I reached my hands forward and unbuttoned his pants. I slowly unzipped them and his rock-hard dick flung out.

“No underwear?” I asked Peter suggestively. Peter raised and lowered his eyebrows in a manner that was equally playful and sexy.

“Take those off.” Peter demanded, gesturing with his head toward my own pants. In seconds they were crumpled in a pile across the room. Peter kicked his pants off, too, so I was lying naked below him as he straddled my waist, playfully grinding his own dick against mine. He teasingly stroked me and I moaned with pleasure as my dick was finally touched. He leaned in close to me and whispered in my ear, “I hope yo—“

An explosion rattled the room and we were plunged into darkness as its shockwave blew out all of the candles. Peter instantly covered my body with his in a protective stance. I could tell he went from sexy to superhero the second the explosion happened. A pit formed in my stomach. Something wasn’t right. My whole body seemed to be disagreeing with what was happening, my blood felt like it was boiling. I was sweating profusely but goosebumps covered my skin. Something was definitely wrong.

“Peter?” He hugged me close as I called out for him.

“I’m just going to check what happened. I’m right here, okay? Nothing’s going to happen to you, I promise.” I felt Peter climb off of me as he said this, leaving me cold and exposed. I crawled under the covers, giving myself a sense of artificial safety. No light from the streetlamps were seeping into the room through the window; the explosion seemed to have knocked out the power everywhere. Suddenly, a warm glow filled the room as Peter began slowly relighting the candles. “Power’s out,” Peter said. He had already suited up in his Spider-Man suit.

“Peter, please,” I pleaded with him, “Stay with me. I’m scared.” He looked at me from across the room. I could see all that I needed in his face. He looked brave, but in his eyes you could tell that he was terrified. Not for himself, but he was terrified of what could happen to me. What could happen to me while he was saving the world. We both knew he had to go out there and leave me.

“Go.” I said, contradicting myself from moments before. This was about more than just me. “They need you more than I do.” Peter rushed towards me and wrapped his arms around me.

“I’m so sorry, Gus. This isn’t what I—“ Peter tried to explain himself, but he didn’t have to.

“Stop right there. Go be a hero. You have to. I love you. I’ll be okay. After all, we can have as much sex as we want in 30 minutes when you come back from saving the world.” I smiled at him and he smiled back, comforted knowing that I was giving him my blessing to be a hero.

“I love you. I’ll see you soon. I promise.” Peter said. Before I knew it, the curtains of our window billowed out into the street behind Peter as he leapt from the window and swung away. I curled up into a ball underneath the blanket. Why was I so cold? But so warm at the same time? Something was wrong. Something more than just what Peter was fighting. I looked down at my hands and arms, and was faced with the eerily familiar sight of bright blue veins clearly visible through my skin. My vision became blurry. Oh, god. What was—

 

PETER’S POV

 

I swung down the street from our villa. God, I hoped Gus would be safe. Hopefully, he was far enough away from the explosion so that nothing could happen to him. I could see smoke rising into the air and an orange glow of fire a few blocks away.

“I’m getting a large heat signature in that direction, Peter.” Karen said to me. I turned the corner and saw what caused the explosion: a car crashed into the side of a power plant, one that was conveniently located between two residential apartment buildings. A few drinks too many must have caused the driver to lose control and crash. At least I knew that Gus would be safe and it wasn’t Electro or Doc Ock trying to ruin my life _again_. Still, the crash caused a raging fire and it looked like I was the only one there to help people who needed it.

Fire was quickly spreading onto the neighboring buildings, but I had to save the driver first. I swung down onto the ground and tried to tear the door off of the car, but it was jammed into place by the crash. I could see the driver inside, unconscious but alive. I ran to the back of the car and broke the glass of the back window, crawling inside and pulling the driver out. I placed her gently on the other side of the road where the fire wouldn’t endanger her and leapt headfirst into the burning apartment building next to the power plant. I could hear the sirens of fire trucks and ambulances pulling into the street below; at least I wouldn’t be facing this alone.

“So much for staying low-key,” I mumbled to myself as I leapt from the building with a mother and her son in my arms.

“È l’uomo ragno!” An Italian firefighter shouted out to his coworkers. They all cheered for me as I brought the last remaining people out of the buildings.

“Is it all clear?” One of the firefighters asked in a thick Italian accent as he stepped forward.

“Todo bueno!” I shouted back, but I was greeted with strange looks.

“I think you’re thinking of Spanish, Peter…” Karen’s voice said inside my mask. I gave them two thumbs up instead and leapt away, embarrassed, as the firefighters began to shoot powerful streams of water into the buildings.

I raced across rooftops and through the streets of Rome back to Gus. This was the _last_ thing I had wanted to do that night, but Gus was right. Sometimes being a hero came above other things.

“What would I do without him?” I said to myself.

“Well, lots of things, Peter. For starters you could—“ Karen answered.

“I wasn’t asking you, Karen! Go away for a bit. I need some private time with Gus.” I told Karen as I landed gently next to the window on the wall of our bedroom. My lips craved the taste of Gus again as I remembered what we were doing moments before the explosion. I climbed into the room slowly and quietly, removing my mask as I did so. Gus was on his side in the bed facing the opposite way, so I thought it would be fun to surprise him.

“Guess who’s back from saving the world?” I said seductively. Gus didn’t respond. Oh god, had he already fallen asleep? “I’ll give you a hint…” I said as I crept towards him. Still no response. “They have something _really_ big that they want to put inside of you…” Nothing from Gus. I crawled into bed behind him and spooned him. “Do you just want to continue sleeping and postpone this? It’s totally fine if you do, I never say no to a sleepy cuddle with my—“ I cut myself off as my hand wrapped around his body and touched his skin. He was ice cold. “Gus?” I said nervously as I flipped him over.

His body limply rolled over and I nearly vomited in sheer horror. Every single vein in his body was visible and was bright blue. The whites of his eyes had turned blue and were glazed over and motionless. A thick, blue liquid was seeping out of his mouth, nose, eyes, and ears.

“ _GUS?!_ ” I shook him. He didn’t move. I touched my fingers to just under his jaw on his neck. No pulse. Maybe I couldn’t feel it because my suit was on. I tore my suit off and touched my fingers to his neck again. Nothing. Maybe I could feel a pulse if I tried his wrist. Nothing.

“Karen, check Gus’ vitals. _NOW!_ ”

“I’m sorry, he needs to be wearing the—“ I didn’t need to hear anything else. I shoved Gus’ hand into the glove of the suit.

“Karen, check Gus’ vitals!”

“Reading… reading… reading… Negative. He has no vital signs. No heartbeat. No blood in his veins whatsoever. Peter… he’s—“

“ _DON’T SAY IT!_ ” I shouted out, tears streaming down my face.

“Peter, I’m sorry, he—“

“ _KAREN, NO!_ ” I had gone through this once before. But even then, a small part of me never saw him actually die. I had a small sliver of hope. But here he was, in front of me. Not moving. Not breathing. Heart not beating. He was—

“Peter. He’s dead.”

 

— END ARC 1: BEGINNINGS —

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's all folks! Of Arc 1, at least. The first chapter of Arc 2 is gonna be coming either in like a week or two weeks, depending on when I get it done, but it will be posted to this fic, I'm not gonna be doing a series. I hope you enjoyed this big finale (as much as you could considering how it ended) and let me know any feedback you have or any theories you have about what's coming!
> 
> I came up with the idea of this ending with a friend one day when I slept over at their house. We were just talking about what I should do with the future of my fanfic and we ended up planning it up until the final arc, so get ready. This is just the beginning of the stuff we came up with together. It doesn't even begin to compare to the twists and turns of what's coming.
> 
> Also before I start Arc 2 you I’m gonna be going back and proofreading and editing some of Arc 1 (I’ve definitely been noticing way too many grammatical errors looking back on some of the older chapters lol) and maybe adding a little bit more backstory for Gus so if you feel the need to reread you might find something you didn’t before!
> 
> I have a Tumblr!  
> https://www.tumblr.com/blog/twosidedspidermanbitch
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!


	25. Sweet Dreams

— ARC 2 —

“I love you more than anything, Peter Parker.” Gus was lying on my chest. His leg draped over mine as he hugged my torso tightly. His head was rising and falling slowly as my chest heaved. We were both completely naked and gasping for breath. We had just had sex for about the tenth time in a row.

“I don’t know what I would have done if you died. I seriously thought my world was over.” I said, holding Gus close to me.

“Let’s just be thankful that Tony was able to revive me so quickly. It’s better that we just don’t question our luck. Thank god he immediately suited up and started flying to Rome the second the explosion happened.” Gus remarked as he traced circles on my chest with his index finger, tickling me and arousing me all at the same time. Gus was noticing. “Oh, ready for another round already?”

I nodded, pulling Gus close to me for a kiss.

“I didn’t know you inherited the extreme stamina of a spider as well…” Gus said teasingly as he worked his way down my body with his lips, slowly making his way towards my erect dick.

“Wait…” I stopped Gus from moving any further down and brought him back up to me, holding his face in front of mine.

“What is it?” Gus asked, a glimmer of playful curiosity in his eyes.

“I just want to look at you. I’m so happy you’re here with me. For good.” I said.

“Am I though?” Gus asked, seriously. My stomach dropped with the sudden change in tone.

“What?” I asked.

“Am I? Back for good?” Gus said it again, giggling as he said it this time.

“Gus, you’re confusing me. What do you mean?” Gus just kept on laughing, more and more loudly, more and more violently. Soon his laughing became hard to understand. It sounded like he was laughing while gurgling water. Flecks and drops of fluid started coming out of his mouth. Thick. Bright blue. His eyes soon turned the same color. He was covered in the substance. The laughing wouldn’t end. It just got louder and louder as he body began seeping the thick blue liquid out of every opening, every pore.

“GUS?!” I screamed. It was happening all over again. I was losing him all over again. And, once again, I couldn’t do anything. Then, Gus’ back burst open as four mechanical arms smashed their way out from the inside, sending blood and blue liquid alike flying around the room. Only, it wasn’t a room. It was the lair. Dr. Octopus’ lair. Where it all started. Where the serum was introduced to Gus’ body. Where Gus—

I woke up with a jolt in my bed, covered in nervous sweat. I could barely breathe. The same dream again. It hadn’t happened for a few weeks now. I thought I finally got past it. I thought I was finally getting better after the long months since it happened.

“Peter!” May burst into my room and immediately sat next to me on my bed, cradling me in her arms. “Just breathe… it’s okay… I’m here… everything’s okay…” As May comforted me I noticed her take the framed photo of Gus and I together in Spain on my bedside table and lay it face down so I wouldn’t see it. My breathing was slowly returning to normal and I gently pulled away from May, letting her know that I was okay.

“Same dream again?” She asked. I nodded. “Peter, you can’t sleep in this thing. You need to take it off. At least wash it.” May said as she pinched my spider-suit off of my skin.

“I need to go.” I said, sternly.

“Peter, please. Don’t go out now.” I got up out of bed and walked towards my window, opening it in a swift motion. I paused.

“May, I—“

“I understand, Peter. I’m not happy about it, but I understand. Just be safe.” I leapt into the air, pulling my mask over my face as I did so. With the fresh air surrounding me, I felt like I could breathe again. Ever since… anyways, it was one of the only ways I felt burden-less again. I never aimed for anything when I had my late-night swings. I was never trying to fight crime or do good. It was always just for myself, to clear my head. But somehow, I always ended up in the same place. The place I was standing a mere 20 minutes after leaving May and jumping out my window. Standing above a gravestone. _His_ gravestone.

> Gus Myers
> 
> May 17, 2001 - October 18, 2018
> 
> A beloved son, brother, and friend

I kneeled down at the gravestone, reading those words over and over. They were etched into my mind more than they were etched into the stone in front of me. I gently placed my hand on top of the fresh flowers placed at the base of his gravestone. Someone must have come by earlier that day. Kitty, maybe, or his family. Next to them were the flowers I brought for him a few days ago. They were shriveled now, but you could see the stems were broken and bent and the petals were damaged even before they started to whither at the gravestone. I tried bringing them in my backpack after school one day but they were absolutely destroyed by the time I got there. Gus would have found that hilarious, though, so I didn’t beat myself up too much for it.

“I don’t care about the flowers, dummy, just kiss me.” Is what he would have said. I smiled, imagining him tossing the flowers to the side and commenting on how hot I looked in my Spider-Man costume.

I placed my hand on his gravestone and caressed it gently, as if it was Gus himself. The sun was rising behind me. “I should probably head back and get ready for school, now. I’ll be back after school as long as Mathletes doesn’t run too long. Anyways, you and I both know I’ll probably be back tomorrow at 5AM again. I know, I should be sleeping, but I just gotta do it sometimes. You understand, don’t you? I’ll talk to you later.” I stood up and stretched my back. It began to ache after crouching for so long. I stepped a few feet away so that I wouldn’t fuss up the grass above him too much when I leapt away. I turned back to him one more time.

“I love you more than anything, Gus Myers.” And I swung away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back with the first chapter of Arc 2! You might have noticed that there's no subtitle to Arc 2 (like how Arc 1 was Arc 1: Beginnings), but there actually will be, it's just a bit of a spoiler for what this arc will be about so I'm going to wait for the reveal.
> 
> This chapter is a little short, but I promise they'll be getting meatier. I just wanted you to have a little taste of what Peter's life has been like since Gus' death. I knew that this period of post-Gus' death was coming so I really want do include those 5 or so chapters of Peter and Gus in Europe so that we could see them happy together and having cute couple-y moments before all this mess happened.
> 
> Let me know how you're liking it! Thank you so much for reading!
> 
> I have a tumblr!  
> https://twosidedspidermanbitch.tumblr.com


	26. Star-Spangled Man

Swinging away from Gus and the cemetary, I was reminded of one of the first times I visited Gus after he died. It was about three weeks after Rome happened and I was changing in the bathroom out of my Spider-Man suit before I went out to visit his grave. At night, I didn’t care much about wearing my costume and visiting Gus, but during the day there was a chance that someone else might see me while visiting a loved one. I crept into the bathroom carefully, making sure no one was watching me. I thought I heard footsteps around the corner, which made me paranoid, but I ignored it and locked myself into one of the stalls. I pulled my pants and shirt on over the costume so that I could easily change back after visiting Gus, but halfway through changing I heard the door swing open and shut as someone entered the bathroom. Heavy footsteps echoed around the bathroom.

“Peter.” A deep, commanding, yet kind and comforting voice spoke to me.

“Uh... who’s there?” I was frozen in my place. Who was this person and how did they know who I was?

“It’s fine, son. I know who you are. Both _you_ and the other one. The Spider-Man. We need to talk.” The disembodied voice said. I slipped my mask over my head and whispered as quietly as I could,

“Karen, can you identify who it is?”

“Based upon vocal patterns and an X-Ray scan, the person outside the stall seems to be Captain Steven Grant Rogers, or, Captain America.”

“You got that right, lady.” Captain America said. I slowly opened the stall door, wearing my spider-suit and pants alone.

“How did you hear her?” I asked, so dumbfounded by everything that was happening, I didn’t know what else to say.

“Super hearing.” Cap said, smiling as he tapped his right ear.

“Oh, right, yeah...” I said in response. I had no clue what to do. He had changed a lot since I last fought him in Germany. His costume was battered and blackened, and his hair had grown out and turned a lot darker than his iconic golden blonde locks. He had a beard that rivaled even Thor’s, and a much darker aura than the Star-Spangled Man the world was used to.

“You’re probably wondering why I’m here, kid.” He said, interrupting my intense gaze at him.

“Uhh... yeah. Only a bit.” I stammered out.

“Tony contacted me.” If I was drinking something in that moment, I would have done a spit take.

“I’m sorry, _what_?” I said in disbelief.

“He cares about you. He thought I might have some wisdom that would help you with what you’re going through.” He gestured to the door behind him that led out into the rest of the cemetery and I instantly figured out that he was talking about Gus.

“Oh.” With all the excitement about meeting one of my childhood heroes, I had practically forgotten about the gaping hole in my life.

“Here, sit down.” Cap patted next to him as he sat down on a bench in a corner of the bathroom. I sat down next to him, my shoulders slumping down and my head hanging. I felt his firm hand slowly rest itself onto my back and give me a small but comforting pat.

“I understand what you’re going through a lot more than you think.” He said as he let his hand rest on my back. I looked up at him, confused. “Bucky. He was... more than a friend. A lot more. _Is_ a lot more… He’s my boyfriend.” My mouth gaped open in shock as Cap continued, “I don’t know why I still can’t just get right out and say it. I guess a lot of the past still lingers in my head. It’s hard to shake old habits. You see, we started dating back in the 30s. Before the serum and everything, when it was just Steve and Bucky. We couldn’t be public about it, for obvious reasons, and when the War rolled around, we especially had to keep it under wraps. If there were even _rumors_ that you were gay back then, they wouldn’t let you enlist. But, hell, getting into the army with those rumors was even worse back then. The stories we all heard about those boys that were killed on the home front just sleeping in their beds. Beaten to death by their fellow men-in-arms. When the War started up, Bucky and I both desperately tried to get girlfriends to cover our tracks and make sure no rumors would roll around. Bucky easily got anyone he sought after with those looks. I mean have you _seen_ that smile?” I could see a glimmer of true happiness when he spoke about Bucky this way. A happiness I hadn’t felt within myself since Gus. “Anyways, sorry to get distracted. He got the girls and would kiss ‘em and everything, but he only had his eyes on other guys, never any women. I, on the other hand, liked both guys and gals back then. And still now, nothing’s changed for either of us since then. Of course, now I know Bucky is gay and I‘m bi, but back then it was just gay and straight and lesbian. It wasn’t widespread knowledge beyond that. Even though you could be beaten half to death for being gay or lesbian, it was an unspoken fact that everyone knew they were out there. Being in the middle, though? Unheard of. So it was especially difficult for me to understand that my love for Bucky wasn’t just a ‘phase’ as I always heard from others, since I liked girls, too. It also made it difficult for Bucky and I when we were forced to get with women so no one would suspect anything, since Bucky knew that, while he was doing it purely to cover his tracks, I was actually able to enjoy it. Of course, I only had any feelings for Bucky ever, and I told him that, too, but it’s difficult to not imagine your bisexual boyfriend enjoying kissing and dating other woman. Anyways, I wasn’t ever with other woman until after the serum. Even though the serum brought women into my life, which made things a lot harder between me and Bucky, it made things a lot more clear since I was able to know Bucky was the one person who loved me not for what I looked like or how many muscles I had… but for who I was on the inside.” Cap looked up at me and smiled.

“This is all incredible, Captain—“ He cut me off before I could go any further.

“Please, call me Steve.” I laughed nervously before continuing.

“Steve, right. But I still don’t understand how this could help me.” Steve sighed deeply and rested his forearms on his knees as he slouched his back, showing the first sign of his humanity through his flawless exterior.

“Then, he died.” My gut dropped. Of course, how could I have forgotten that Bucky had died in WWII? Steve continued, “Honestly, a lot of the War after that was a blur. I just wanted to avenge Bucky. Since I needed to keep my romance with Bucky a secret, I never truly confided in anyone. I had to keep it all on the inside. Still, I did confide in Peggy a lot more when Bucky died, but my confusion and own inner turmoil over keeping the true nature of my relationship with Bucky a secret scrambled my feelings. I let myself think that I was actually in love with Peggy, when it was really my grief confusing my true romantic feelings. What I’m trying to say is… I let Bucky’s death blind me. I didn’t use my best judgement after that happened. I want to help you with your grief. Don’t do what I did. Don’t let it cloud your judgement. It’s hard to lose the person you love, and it’s even harder when you can’t tell anyone that you loved them. You need to tell people, Peter, for yourself. You don’t have to come out to the world, just to a few people that can really help you through this. I didn’t, and it screwed up my mind more than being frozen for 70 years did.” I was hunched over, hiding my face from Steve. “What is it, son?” He asked me. I turned towards him, revealing the tears streaming down my cheeks and dripping off of my chin.

“I just miss him so much,” I sobbed out.

“I know. I did too.” Steve said as he wrapped his arms around me. I leaned my head into my chest and sobbed into him. I placed my hand on his chest as I pressed my whole body against his in grief. I could feel his massive chest muscles ripple underneath his skin as he rubbed my back. Soon, my sobs of sorrow were slowly turning into heaves of laughter. I broke away from Steve and burst out laughing as I wiped the tears away from my face. Steve chuckled nervously.

“We alright there, son?” He asked, concerned.

“It’s just… I’m sorry, this is awkward, but Gus had the biggest crush on you and would be so jealous of me right now cause I just got to feel your chest as you held me close to you.” Steve was laughing now, too. Suddenly, the door creaked open. A wave of fear washed over me and I flung myself behind one of the stalls so whoever walked in wouldn’t be able to see me in my spider-suit.

“It’s alright, Peter, it’s a friend.” Steve said reassuringly. I crawled around the side of the stall and peered out, only to be greeted with a familiar face but with an unfamiliar hair color.

“Nice to officially meet you, Peter.” Black Widow said. She was sporting new bleach-blonde hair.

“Ohmygodblackwidowitssogoodtomeetyouiloveyournewhairithoughtyouwereastrangersoihidimsosorryifiknewitwasyouiwouldnthavehid.” I blurted out.

“You really think we wouldn’t be making sure no civilians walked in on Captain America and Spider-Man having a deep talk about sexuality? What were you guys laughing about, anyways? I thought this was supposed to be getting emotional.” Steve and I looked at each other and began giggling.

“Uhh… just how hot Steve is.” I said, which only made Cap and I laugh more. Black Widow just rolled her eyes.

“I hate both of you. Steve, sorry, but we gotta go. Tony may have given us a free pass to be out in the open again but it doesn’t mean we’re not war criminals anymore.” Black Widow said sharply as she walked out of the bathroom.

“I’m sorry I have to go, Peter. I hope I helped with… all of this. I know how hard it can be.” Steve said solemnly as he stood up.

“Thank you so much, Captain. For everything. You really helped me a lot.” I said. Steve gave me a nod and a smile before jogging out of the bathroom. A few seconds later I heard the roar of a jet plane taking off and soaring away. I slipped the rest of my clothes on over my spider-suit and went outside to visit Gus, telling him everything that had just happened to me. I was sure to describe every detail of Cap’s muscles.

That night when I went home, I told Aunt May everything. About my being bi, my real relationship with Gus, and everything that had happened between us (leaving out the more intimate moments, of course). She was nothing but happy for me and supportive of everything that I was going through. I forgot that she went through a very similar process with Ben, and she was more than willing to help me go through my process with Gus.

As I swung away from the cemetery and the memory of meeting Captain America faded from my mind, I realized that I had come a very far way since that fall when Gus died and I encountered Cap. It had been abut four months since Gus passed away, and Spring was finally coming back to New York City. Things were calming down in my life. Though Spider-Man had been a nice distraction from everything that was going on with Gus in the past few months, the crime business was really hibernating throughout the winter. Maybe it was time for me to focus on school for once in my life, even.

I landed swiftly and softly in the alley down the block from school and removed my mask. I pressed the spider-symbol on my chest, allowing my suit to become loose and slip easily off of my body. I crouched behind a dumpster so that no one would see the random teenager stripping naked in the alleyway. Oddly, I felt a strange warmth from above me and a warm orange glow was covering the alley. I ignored it and tried to fit my jeans over my legs. The pants were twisted around so it was hard to fit my legs in. I suddenly heard a voice from above me.

“I can see you’re struggling there, but please, the longer you have those pants off the better.” I instantly turned beet red. Who was watching me from above in this alley? Thankfully they only started tuning in now and didn’t see my taking off my suit. The warmth grew closer as the glow, too, grew closer to the ground. I slowly turned around and saw a boy about my age, totally covered in flames, descend into the alley behind me. In an instant, the flames were gone, revealing a breathtakingly handsome teen boy with bright blonde hair sticking directly into the sky. He was wearing a blue onesie with a “4” symbol in the center. “I mean, I thought I was hot, but you’re _smokin’._ Oh, I should probably introduce myself. I’m Johnny Storm and, from the looks of it, you must be Spider-Man.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay I had this whole plan (which is still happening don't worry) but then suddenly out of nowhere I had this idea that I would throw in a chapter with Captain America and basically confirm Stucky within the world of this pic and I loved it so I deviated from the plan for a chapter just to throw Stucky in there. THEN I had another idea that Johnny Storm would come into the picture and we would have some fun with him. Maybe spideytorch will happen. Maybe it won't. Who knows. But basically we're deviating from the plan a little bit. The plan is still intact, but first we're gonna add some Johnny Storm fun. I hope you're excited!!!
> 
> I have a Tumblr!!!  
> https://twosidedspidermanbitch.tumblr.com


	27. A Hot Predicament

Instinct kicked in, literally, and I kicked the boy in front of me directly on the side of his jaw, sending his head and body into the wall of the alley. I snatched one of my web shooters out of my backpack and webbed him to the wall by the hand so he couldn’t move.

“What the _hell_ , dude?!” He exclaimed.

“ _You’re_ ‘what the hell’-ing _me_ right now?! What the hell, you!” I shouted back.

“I’m Johnny Storm! I’m a friendly!” He said as he held his jaw in pain while struggling to remove his hand from the wall. He was talking as if his name alone should make me less scared of him.

“Am I supposed to know who you are?”

“Uhh… yeah. Johnny Storm. The Human Torch. Of the Fantastic Four.” I stared at him, dumbfounded. He continued, “Have you watched any of the news for the past, I don’t know, _three months?!_ ”

“I’ve been… dealing with some personal stuff.” I responded.

“Yeah, no wonder. Everyone’s been wondering why Spider-Man has been so off the radar lately.” As I stared at his suit longer, I realized it did ring a bell. I remembered that I had seen a news article about a new superhero team in New York. I brushed it off when I first saw it, thinking it would come and go like most superhero wannabes, but it looked like this one was sticking around, and not in a way that I wanted.

“Okay, even if you are part of the ‘Frivolous Four’ or whatever…”

“Fantastic.” He corrected me.

“Yes, Fantastic Four, same difference… Anyways, why would that make me trust you?”

“Cause I’m a teen superhero, too! I get the struggle, dude! Everyone always acts like they wanna be my friend just because I get to live in a giant tower with Reed Richards, my sister’s dumb husband, but—“ I cut him off.

“WAIT. Your sister’s husband is _REED. RICHARDS???”_ I said in disbelief.

“Yeah, who cares? He’s just a dipwad with a dumb lab.”

“Ummmmm… Reed Richards is one of the smartest minds alive today! He’s up there with Tony Stark and Princess Shuri of Wakanda! Why do you get to live with him?”

“Well, ever since the whole accident gave us powers Reed wanted us all to live under one roof so he could study us in case we ever became dangerous, but now we just use it as a base for superhero-ing.”

“Accident? What accident?” I asked.

“You really don’t watch the news, do you? My sister, Sue, and Reed and his best friend, Ben, and I all went up into a spaceship to do some science-y shit or something but some space energy or something hit us and now I can do fire stuff, Sue can turn invisible, Reed can just stretch (haha what a lame-ass power), and Ben is just a pile of rocks now.”

“You. Got to go. On a science space ship. With Reed. RICHARDS?!” I felt like my mind was exploding with jealousy.

“Yeah, my sister thought it would be educational for me or something. I learned nothing from it but look at what I can do now!” Suddenly Johnny erupted into flames in front of me, dissolving the webbing that was holding him to the wall with his heat.

“Shut that off! Someone might see!” I said urgently as I looked over my shoulder, making sure no wandering people were walking into the alley to check out the sudden raging fire.

“Alright, alright.” Johnny levitated slowly down to the ground before his flames suddenly disappeared when he was about one foot from the ground. He fell and landed on both feet, but stumbled forward into me. I caught him and he stood up while keeping ahold of my arm to keep steady. As he straightened himself, he was only inches away from my face. He was a few inches taller than me, but he looked down slightly as I looked up at him so we were facing each other. He smiled a charming and handsome smile and stayed there, gazing into my eyes. I started to feel warm. Not because of him, but because of nerves. I stepped away from him, averting my gaze so I wouldn’t look into his crystal clear blue eyes again and become entranced.

“Anyways, I should probably throw these pants on and get to class. I’m probably gonna be late.” I awkwardly pulled the pants over my legs and buckled my belt around my waist. I stuffed the remainder of my belongings into my backpack as Johnny said,

“So… coffee date?” I froze in my place and stood straight up, rigid. Luckily I was facing away from him because I was beet red.

“Uh… like just grab some coffee? As two people getting coffee? I, uh… I don’t really drink… coffee.” I stammered out

“Well, you don’t have to have coffee. But I thought it might be good to talk this all through. Considering I know your identity and everything. Right… Peter Parker?” I turned around abruptly.

“How did you know my name?” I demanded. He held up my wallet that must have fallen out of my pants and opened it up, revealing my student ID. “Give me that.” I said as I snatched my wallet away from him. “I really have to go.” I turned back around towards the exit of the alley and fast-walked away from the charming stranger.

“I’ll meet you here after school! We can grab hot chocolate or something!” I gave him a wave goodbye from behind and turned the corner onto the sidewalk. My heart was racing. My stomach was fluttering. Was it the fear that someone just found out who I was? Or could it be… no. It couldn’t be. I wasn’t ready for anyone else in my life. I still needed time. Right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay! I just started school up so I'm gonna have less time to write, but the more feedback I get the more encouraged I'll be to write, so please let me know what you think of the direction I'm going in. I know statistically that introducing another love interest after the first one dies or something never works out but who knows, maybe Johnny isn't a love interest, maybe he is, maybe the first love interest didn't die or something, or maybe he did. You'll have to keep reading!
> 
> I have a Tumblr!  
> https://twosidedspidermanbitch.tumblr.com


	28. The Executive

The second I heard the sirens outside my classroom window, I leapt out of my chair.

“Peter! I understand that some people have bathroom… emergencies, but please ask politely next time and walk out of my class in an orderly fashion if you need to excuse yourself!” my English teacher exclaimed.

“So sorry! I’ll remember that next time! Just… when you gotta go, you gotta go, amirite?” I said hurriedly as I sped towards the door. Class was dragging on anyways and I needed an excuse to get out. I ran into the bathroom and scurried onto the ceiling and out of the skylight so I could change on the roof. One swift removal of my shirt and pants later, I was stories high in the air, chasing after a long line of police vehicles who were blazing through downtown Manhattan.

“Karen, what’s the deal here?”

“Patching into police scanners now…” Karen responded. A static radio stream soon took over the in-mask speakers.

“We have a middle-aged white male with short black hair holding some sort of device. The device seems to be foreign and it’s releasing a lot of dangerous energy blasts.” The policewoman over the radio said.

“Don’t worry, New York! Your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man is here!” I shouted out as I swung past a group of people waiting at a bus stop.

“Shut up, it’s not even 10AM yet!” I heard one disgruntled bystander shout back at me as I swung away. Well, you can’t win them all over.

As the police cars came to a stop near Union Square, I perched on a nearby building to scope out the situation. There was a man in the center of the park wearing a pretty generic business suit. There was nothing generic about what was in his hands, though. He was holding some type of containment device, but it clearly wasn’t doing its job. Giant bright red strands of energy burst from all ends of the device, sending whips of red light violently into the surrounding area. It was strange, though. Whatever the energy hit didn’t burn or explode, it kind of just disappeared. One band of energy sliced right through a fruit stand, and the center chunk of the stand was simply gone, as if someone erased it. Whatever it was, it needed to be stopped.

I swung down from my perch and landed a safe distance away from the man, but close enough that I could talk to him.

“Hey, Mr. Business Man! This is Union Square! Wall Street is a long way South and Midtown is a up North! God, people these days think that they can get away with not even knowing how to get around NY— GAAH!” I leapt out of the way as a read streak of light slashed right through where I was standing.

“Get out of here! I’m not trying to hurt anyone more than I already have!” The man shouted at me, “Just let me try to figure this thing out and I won’t bother anyone else!” He tightened his grip on the handle on the side of the device and twisted it clockwise. The device began to grow brighter, and people around me were covering their eyes to shield themselves from the blinding light.

“Karen, can you—“

“Already on it, Peter.” My lenses dimmed so I could take our mysterious business man down while actually being able to use my eyes. With the increased light output of the device, the energy bands were increasing in frequency and I could sense them growing more powerful in the air. Strangely, the man holding the device seemed to be fading for brief seconds, then snapping back into full view, as if he, too, were being erased by the device.

“If you don’t want to cause any more harm why don’t you just turn the device off and put it down calmly!” I called out to the man, “Please!”

“You don’t understand! This is my only way out of here! I wouldn’t be doing it somewhere where people could get hurt, but I had to or else I wouldn’t get to use this!” He screamed back over the loud hum of whatever was in his hands.

“I get it, NYC housing prices are through the roof right now, but I’m pretty sure if you wanted to get out of the city you could move upstate. Commuting isn’t all that bad!” I quipped as I dodged between energy streams.

“You know, my daughter thinks you’re hilarious. She won’t believe me when I see her again and I can tell her I met Spider-Man in person. Just leave me alone and let me see her again!”

“Look, I’m sure there are many easier ways to see your daughter than sending a matter-consuming energy bomb loose on Union Square, maybe we can just talk this out?”

“Not since the courts took her away! I didn’t want to do this, but he offered it to me and I couldn’t resist. Not just a new life, Spider-Man, a new _reality_. A new _me_ to be. I’m sorry anyone has to get hurt, but it was the only way.” He pushed either end of the device in towards the center, and the device rapidly grew even brighter while the humming grew even louder. I leapt into the air and came crashing down onto the man from above. The device fell out of his hands and went skidding across the concrete while he collapsed. He may have had a life-threatening energy device of some sort, but he was just a normal guy himself. I quickly shot a web line at a manhole and yanked the lid off, kicking the mysterious contraption down the hole and into the sewage pipe below, being careful not to let any of the energy beams erase my ankles out of existence while I did so.

As the cops moved in towards the man, I leapt into the sewage pipe after the device to make sure it wouldn’t go randomly through New York’s sewer system erasing toilets from people’s homes. As I landed in the knee-deep sewage water, I immediately saw the device. It had completely powered down. For such a powerful thing, who knew a little bit of water could short circuit it as easy as a toaster? Still, a small glowing red ball of energy remained in the center of the device. No mechanical parts were attached to the energy ball, instead it just sort of rested in the middle of the entire contraption, letting the machine absorb energy from it.

“Karen, if I _were_ to touch it, would it kill me?” I asked.

“I can’t advise you to do so, Peter, but none of my scans are proving it to be fatal.” Karen responded.

I nervously but eagerly reached out towards the energy ball, and poked it with my pointer finger of my right hand. Instantly, I felt a warm buzz cover my entire body as my eyes violently shut on their own accord. Instead of seeing the sewage drain around me, a red-tinted image painted itself onto my eyelids as I saw a whole world with my eyes completely shut. First, flashes of a school. My school. Gus’ school. The hallways. The kids walking through them. One of them stood out in a particular. A boy. Taller than me. Familiar hair. Familiar face. A face I know better than anyone’s. Gus’ face. Gus. Alive. A flash of me there, too. But in the background. Insignificant. But Gus. Alive.

I woke up as my body hit the sewage water mid-fall. I gasped and jolted upright. Was there a chance, even in the slightest, that Gus could be alive? If there was, this device was the key to it. And I wasn’t about to let my chance go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry it's been over a month since an update! I've just been crazy busy with school and friends and life, but here's a new chapter! I'm going to try to post more frequently, at least once a month if not once every two weeks. Thank you so much for being patient! As always, let me know your thoughts down below in the comments, It's so appreciated!


	29. A Whole New World

“It seems to feed off of whatever…” Mr. Stark prodded at the glowing red ball of energy in the center of the device with the end of some piece of metal he picked up off of his lab table. Smaller versions of those same bolts of energy that I saw earlier in Union Square went flying throughout the lab. I took the device up to the Avengers Facility after my private encounter with it in the sewage pipe. Mr. Stark quickly yanked his hand away and the metal clattered to the ground. Only, the part of the metal that touched the energy ball was gone, just like whatever had touched the energy back in the park earlier today. “… _that_ is.” Mr. Stark said as he completed his sentence.

“So what is… _that_?” I asked.

“Well, according to these scans and how it’s behaved towards other objects it’s come in contact with… I’d say it’s some sort of trans-dimensional energy ball of… something.”

“Trans-dimensional?”

“Yeah, trans-dimensional. _Across_ dimension sort of thing. Mr. Business Man or whatever we’re calling him was probably trying to travel to another dimension earlier today. Makes sense with everything he said on scene.”

“What do you mean?”

“The guy earlier—“ Mr. Stark continued

“Quentin Price.” Friday chirped in.

“Yes! Quentin Price. Big-time Wall Street guy. He was high up in many many fancy places. How did he get there, you ask? None other than investing in stock using money won from underground superhuman fight club gambling.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Stark, ‘superhuman fight club’? There’s actually a place where people with powers go and fight and rich people gamble on them?” I asked in disbelief.

“Kid, it’s the 21st century and people can stick to walls and conjure lightning storms. It was only a matter of time before people started doing dumb shit like this. Anyways, he got busted, he lost all of his money, and his wife sued him for custody of his daughter and won (hence our incident downtown earlier today)”.

“So what do you think the device had to do with it?”

“If I had to guess, it was somehow made to use that energy source to transport a person across dimensions. I’m guessing he was planning on going to one where he still had custody of his daughter and he lived a happier life. What I’m more concerned about is who the mystery ‘he’ is that offered it to him.”

“Well, do you think that the device could have actually worked?” The question took Mr. Stark by surprise.

“Uh… I mean… if it did work it wouldn’t be without a _huge_ cost. Probably wipe out a few city blocks in the process. But there’s no way to know without testing it.”

“Oh cool!” I played dumb for just long enough to get al the info I needed out of him. I felt bad using Mr. Stark like this but I had a hunch and I wasn’t about to just let it go. “Alright, well I better head back to the city! I have Mathletes later tonight.”

“Alright, thanks for bringing this in. I’ll have Happy call you a car back. You know the way out?”

“Yeah, for sure. I’ve been here plenty enough by now.”

“See ya later then, kid.” Mr. Stark walked out of the lab. I waited a few moments to make sure he was far away enough to not hear anything that was going on.

“Karen?” I asked into the empty room.

“Yes, Peter?” Karen’s voice emerged. Mr. Stark would soon regret hooking Karen up to the Avengers Facility system for me.

“Could you shut down the lab into a protective safety protocol for me?”  
“What level of safety, Peter?”

“Um… like the kind that you’d need if you were to do something that would wipe out a few city blocks normally but you want to do it in this lab and not harm anything beyond this lab?”

“Peter, maybe you shouldn’t be doing something that dangerous…”

“Karen. Please.”

“Activating safety mode.” Her voice said. I could almost hear the concern in it. Heavy shutters crashed down over every window and door, sealing the lab in.

“Okay, Gus. Here goes nothing.” I lifted the device carefully off of the table. The metal handles on either end were cold, but I could feel the heat and energy radiating from the center trans-dimensional energy bal. I thought back to what the guy did earlier today. I tentatively pushed either end of the device towards the center slowly. I could feel it vibrate in my hands. It was hard to hold onto it. A humming emerged and grew louder and, once again, large and violent ribbons of energy lashed out from the device. The whole lab was shaking now and it was hard to see past the blinding light of the device. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and pushed the handles in towards the center in one sudden movement. For a split second, everything grew in intensity. It felt like my body was going to be torn apart from the vibrations. Then, it all went still. My body felt weightless and light.

Unfortunately, that only lasted a brief moment. My body was suddenly slammed against something cold and metal. I opened my eyes abruptly and found myself crumpled against a row of lockers. In a hallway. In the school Gus and I went to.

“Watch out next time, Penis Parker!” I looked up and came face-to-face with my favorite bully, Flash Thompson. “Oh what’s this, your science project? I know where this would look _great_!” He proceeded to pick up the trans-dimensional device and throw it into a garbage can.

“Flash, what are you doing, you love science too. You’re not really doing anything for yourself by making fun of me for liking science. Anyways, what are you doing here? Don’t you still go to Midtown?” I said, weakly. I struggled to stand up but it felt like all of the muscles in my body had been completely erased.

“PFFFT! _Me?!?!_ Like _science?!?!_ Get a load of this, Kitty!” Kitty. My eyes grew wide as Gus’ best friend stepped forward from a crowd of kids behind Flash, watching the show.

“Kitty!” I said excitedly.

“Flash, lay off, okay? Don’t be an asshole. Do you need a hand up, Peter?” She reached out her hand to me.

“Kitty! Oh my god, it’s you! Uh, I’m fine, I can get up on my own, thanks!” I shifted my body weight onto my legs and they crumpled under me, sending me falling face-first onto the floor in front of me.

“HAHAHA! Guys, look at Penis Parker! It’s been so long since he left the Chem Lab that he forgot how to use his legs!” Flash said, oh-so-kindly. Still, it really was concerning how I wasn’t able to use my body correctly.

“Get away from him, Flash!” A familiar voice said.

“That’s what I was doing! Sorry, Astro!” Flash said, suddenly fearful and acting in-line.

“Hey, Peter, need a hand?” I looked up from the floor. Gus was standing above me, hand outstretched, a smile on his face.

I fell to the floor for a third time and fainted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The triumphant return of Gus! Or is it?? Who is Astro?? Why is Flash scared of him?? Why can't Peter walk?? Did the device work?? The device did work I can answer that one for you. That means we're in a new reality! What else is new in this new reality?? The questions are endless!!
> 
> Let me know your thoughts on how it's going and if you like the direction it's going in!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!


	30. Don't You Dare Close Your Eyes

My eyes fluttered open gently and I took in my surroundings. I was in one of the small cots in the back of the nurse’s office at Eastside High, Gus and my high school. The curtain was drawn between me and the rest of the office, but I could hear voices talking in a low whisper on the other side of it.

“So what do you think, doc?” A man’s voice said. It was familiar, but a voice I hadn’t heard for a while. Why couldn’t I place it?

“Honestly, everything seems fine with Peter. He probably just passed out with shock, but he’s fine now. No indications that this is anything more serious than a single-incident fainting spell. But I still think he should just go home, just for the rest of the day.”

“Alright, good to know. Thanks for everything.”  
“Of course, Mr. Parker.”

The man chuckled. “Please, no need for formalities. Call me Ben.” It hit me like a train (which I’ve felt, so I don’t use that saying lightly). Ben. Ben Parker.

“UNCLE BEN!” I shouted as I burst out of the cot and through the curtain. I ran into him and wrapped my arms around his body. “You’re alive!” I lifted my head from where it was nested in his shoulder and looked up at his face. “It’s really you!”

“Uh… yes I’m alive? I was never told that that wasn’t the case, at least. You feeling alright?”

“YES! I’m feeling SPECTACULAR!”

Uncle Ben laughed nervously. “Alright bud, let’s just get you on home.”

The following subway ride was strange. First off, I hadn’t been on a subway since I became Spider-Man, so I forgot all of my proper subway etiquette and was met with death-stares from strangers when I didn’t take my backpack off to make room for others. Secondly, it was all too clear to me by now that I successfully made it to an alternate dimension, and little changes in the subway car made that even more obvious. Advertisements for a food delivery service called ‘Hub4Grub’ plastered either wall of the subway car, instead of the ‘Grubhub’ that I was used to back in my dimension. And, lastly, I was standing next to UNCLE BEN. The man who had _died_ all but two years ago back in my dimension. Yet, here he was, right in front of me, alive and well. When we got to our stop, instead of turning right to cross the street towards our apartment building, we kept on walking straight. Back towards where we used to live, before Ben died and we had to move somewhere cheaper. A smile formed across my face, stretching from ear to ear.

“What’s up with you today? First fainting, now smiling for no reason.” Uncle Ben asked me.

“Nothing, it’s just… things are good.” Things were more than good. Things were perfect. Things were how they always should have been.

When we got home, there was no typical greeting from Aunt May. “Oh god,” I thought to myself, “Did she die instead of—“

“Your Aunt May couldn’t get out of work today to pick you up but she’ll be home around usual time,” Uncle Ben said, instantly calming any fears I had. “I still have some work to do myself, but take the afternoon easy. Don’t push yourself too hard. I don’t want you fainting on us again, alright?”

“Alright, Uncle Ben.” I gave him a giant hug and squeezed him as hard as I could.

“Woah there! Loosen up the grip! It’s times like these I worry that it’s you that’s actually that Astro kid and not your classmate,” Ben said as he chuckled. There it was again. That name. ‘Astro’. First Flash called Gus it and now Uncle Ben.

The second Uncle Ben retreated to the kitchen table (I’m sure my Aunt May wouldn’t pleased to know that even in a different dimension Uncle Ben still used the kitchen table as his office instead of the room she had cleared out especially for that purpose), I ran upstairs into my old room. Or, current room, apparently? It was just how I left it when we moved out in my own dimension. I ran to my computer (still the same one I found in the dumpster down the block and patched up myself back home) and immediately googled ‘Astro’. A Wikipedia article came up.

> Gus Myers (born May 17, 2001) is more popularly known by his superhero alias Astro. Myers attends Eastside School of Science and Technology (the result of a 2014 merger between schools Eastside High and Midtown School of Science and Technology (MSST) in which most students of MSST were transferred to Eastside High). On a class trip to Empire State University (ESU), Myers’ class was diverted from their scheduled trip to view the Isotope Genome Accelerator due to a spider getting caught within the radioactive rays of the Accelerator. ESU deemed the radioactive spider a dangerous threat to all personnel, and Myers’ class was rushed out of the building. In the confusion, Myers stumbled into ESU’s latest astrophysics experimental lab, tripping and falling directly into a blast of cosmic radiation. Myers was granted the cosmic ability of gravitational control, allowing him the change the source of gravity and force of gravity for any object.
> 
> Though there was a period of time where Astro was an active superhero within New York City and Myers was not identified as Astro, Myers soon made the decision to be public with his superhero alter-ego. Though he expressed his fears about putting his loved ones in danger and being alienated from family and friends, he was largely accepted for making this decision and he soon became a national icon, rivaling superheroes such as Captain America and Iron Woman as a fan-favorite. He famously brought the Superhuman Civil War to an end after grounding each superhero to their spot, literally, and forcing them to talk through any tensions over the actions of Bianca Barnes, The Winter Soldier. Soon it was realized that they were being manipulated by a third party and they successfully stopped Helmut Zemo as a united front.
> 
> Myers, after the events of the Superhuman Civil War, was offered a spot as the first male on the previously all-female international superhero team The Avengers, but he declined, saying that “New York City is my home, and New York City is what I want to protect”.
> 
> Myers has a multitude villains of his own, including—

I pushed myself and my rolling chair away from my computer. “Holy shit. Gus is me,” I thought to myself, “In this dimension, Gus is Spider-Man. Well, not Spider-Man, but Astro, I guess? But it’s like he did everything right, everything _better_ than I ever did. And I just stayed Peter Parker.” The buzz of a text notification from my phone interrupted by thought process. It was from… Kitty? This Peter’s phone password was the same as mine.

“Hey - I know I’m kind of texting you out of nowhere but sorry about Flash today he’s such a dick. Gus and I don’t really like him he always just sort of third wheels with us so I hope you don’t hate Gus and I now haha :P”

“No worries thanks for texting me” I said in response. But this was also a perfect time to get more info out of Kitty. “What do you mean third wheel?” I texted her. It sounded like Gus and Kitty were still best friends in this dimension, which was nice to know some things were still the same.

“Third wheel as in Gus and I are a couple and Flash third wheels hahahaha” My world came to a halt. Gus and Kitty. A _couple_?!

“LOL DUH! So dumb of me to forget but how long have you guys been together again?”

“Ummmmmm like since 9th grade? Right when all of you MSST kids came to Eastside why are you asking”

“Just forgot lol!”

“Haha ok I guess. Anyways Gus has always really wanted to get to know you for some reason so he’s pretty upset that this is basically your first time you guys have met. We both hope you don’t think we’re as big jerks as Flash always is to you!”

And there it was. Gus and I haven’t ever known each other. Not before today, at least. And he’s _straight_ apparently, too! Or he could be bi or pan or something also but dating Kitty of all people! You would think that in other dimensions people would still have the same sexualities, but I guess things can change, even if it means us having never been together.

Then a thought started nagging at the back of my mind. It was dumb but I couldn’t resist. I rolled myself back towards my desk and frantically went to the history of my Google Chrome browser. If this dimension’s Peter was anything like me, he’d normally do the things I’m thinking of on Incognito Mode or something, but everyone forgets sometimes. I kept scrolling farther and farther back. All of his searches and websites pretty much mirrored mine, I just hoped that the websites that mattered mirrored mine too. And boom. There it was. December 16th, 2018 at 11:43:22 PM. “Michael Fassbender penis scene”. And then minutes before at 11:41:47 PM. “Keira Knightley boobs”.

“ _YES!_ ” I shouted out.

“Peter? You okay in there?” Uncle Ben quickly said in response.

“Yes! I’m more than okay!” Because in this universe I was still bi! And still had crushes on Michael Fassbender and Keira Knightley! I knew it was dumb to get so excited about something, but when the gay love of your life dies and then you find him again in another universe but it turns out he’s dating his best friend who’s a girl and there’s nothing in his Wikipedia Personal Life section about coming out as anything remotely LGBTQ+ and not just as a superhero, it’s nice to know that little things like the fact that your counterpart is still bi in another dimension. And that’s when I noticed it: The large bisexual pride flag hanging above my bed. That could only mean… I was out. Not just bi, but this Peter was out. Uncle Ben and Aunt May _must_ have known that I was bi. I guess without any of the spider-secrets or uncle-deaths I felt comfortable telling them that part of my life. I wish my Uncle Ben could have known that part of me.

I spent the rest of the afternoon searching Peter’s room for other clues about new things I should know in this dimension. It was all pretty normal, though. As normal as could be if I never got spider powers which caused me to let my uncle get killed. A lot of photos and memorabilia of Ned and my friendship, all of which were identical to the ones I had back home, confirming that Ned and I were still best friends. However, this Peter’s notebooks stood out. Each of them were littered with little words and phrases and doodles in the margins, except all of them had been scribbled out as if immediately after writing one he had covered it up. All except for one. A small heart with two names written inside. “Peter + Gus”. I looked through the scribbles over the other ones. They were all Gus-related. Small doodles of stick figures labeled with either of our names holding hands or going on dates. Gus’ name written over and over in fancy letters. My heart ached. Even though Gus might have never liked Peter in this dimension, it didn’t mean the opposite wasn’t true. Peter was still in love with Gus, even if this Gus never knew it.

Aunt May soon got back home from work, and decided that my fainting spell called for a treasured Parker family dish: wheatcakes. Of course, it was served with an appetizer of “Benjamin Parker! Get your work _off_ of the kitchen table _right_ now!”. Dinner was, once again, normal. And it felt so good. It also came along with some useful bits of info about Earth-2’s Peter, or Peter-2? Uncle Ben casually mentioned that Peter-2 had gotten into Empire State University Early Decision (something I wasn’t able to bring myself to even apply for since the application date was so soon after Gus’ death). Aunt May talked about how her non-for-profit charity, F.E.A.S.T., was expanding and opening its second branch in Harlem. My Aunt May was about to open F.E.A.S.T. in my dimension when Uncle Ben died, so she had to abandon her passion project and focus on working a 9-to-5 job instead to make money for the two us.

It got me thinking: This Peter had a happy life. Aunt May and Uncle Ben were both alive, and Aunt May was happier than she had ever been back in my dimension. Peter-2 had a clear course of action for his future, and Aunt May and Uncle Ben knew that he was bi! And he still had Ned, obviously. He may not have been Spider-Man, but someone else was. And not just anyone else, the only other person in the world I knew deep inside of me had the responsibility to be Spider-Man. Well, not Spider-Man, per se, but Astro, I guess? And Gus was doing it all better than I ever could. The Avengers were still united _because_ of him. And, side note, The Avengers were all women now, like, how cool was _that_?? Maybe, just maybe, I didn’t come here to get Gus back. Maybe I came here to realize that Gus was more responsible and deserving to have my life than I ever was. And, without the pressure of being a superhero, my life was better, too. Maybe, just maybe, I came here to stay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! Sorry it's been so long I wasn't really motivated to right anything more but here's a big chapter for you. And I'm really excited about where this is going again so you should expect at least one more in the next week or so.
> 
> Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse came out since the last chapter of this fic and I LOVED it and thought it was the best Spider-Man movie ever made, but it's funny since I started planning the whole idea of Peter exploring a different dimension back in July and it just so happened that the alternate universe stuff happened in here and on the big screen at the same time!
> 
> Please let me know what you think of the fic and the direction it's going or just any reaction you're having to it. It's stuff like that that really makes me excited to write more. Thanks so much!


	31. Talk Dirty to Me

The next day at Eastside School of Science and Technology (I still can’t get over that) I started becoming more comfortable as Peter-2. This dimension’s Ned greeted me right when I walked into the building, and he hadn’t changed a bit from my Ned. We spent most of the day together, just like we used to back home at MSST.

I still wasn’t _entirely_ used to my new role in an alternate version of myself’s life. Gus and Kitty were essentially this school’s Michelle and Barak, which was hard for me. On top of that, this Flash was a lot more brutal than the one I was used to. He resorted to more typical means of stuffing people in lockers and dunking their heads in toilet bowls to get his bullying done. And it was hard to deal with that while living without my spider powers for the first time in two years. My extraordinarily ordinary human capabilities threw me off in other parts of life, too. I completely embarrassed myself in front of my entire Biology class after I volunteered to get everyone a textbook for an in-class activity, but then promptly toppled under the weight of them. Not to mention the countless classmates I collided into in the hallway without my spider-sense to warn me of any impending danger.

At the end of the day, I left towards the subway when I heard a familiar voice behind me.

“Peter!” It was Gus. I spun around, shocked and nervous. Gus jogged towards me to catch up with me. “Where you going?”

“To, uhhh, the subway?”

“Aren’t you forgetting something…” I was getting strange vibes from him.

“I don’t think so, why?” Gus kept glancing at an alley that we were approaching up ahead. The same one where I had met Johnny Storm just yesterday back in my universe.

“You know, just, cause like… do I have to spell it out for you?”

“Spell what out?” Suddenly, Gus grabbed my wrist and pulled me into the alley and behind the dumpster, where we were hidden from the sidewalk. “Gus, what are you—“

Gus leaned into me and pressed his lips against mine. His mouth opened gently and I felt his tongue meet my own as one of his hands cupped my cheek while the other pressed my lower back into his pelvis.

“I’ve missed you so much,” he said between kisses. All of my body’s defenses instantly collapsed as I melted into him. I didn’t quite know if this was my Gus brought back to me or not, but I knew that I liked whatever it was, and Gus could tell. My arms slowly began gravitating towards his body. My legs, too, gently lifted from the ground and towards Gus, allowing me to wrap them around him. My torso was pulled closer to him and an invisible force gently pressed my face closer into his. That’s when I realized that he was using his powers to make me gravitate into him. My dick stirred as Gus’ hands ran down my back. He ran one hand through my hair, sending chills down my spine, and the other squeezed my butt, pushing my pelvis and noticeable boner even further into his own. Abruptly, blood rushed south and I was harder than I had ever been before, as if the blood in my body was told that its center of gravity was the tip of the throbbing dick in my already-wet underwear. The unseen force on my waist pressed my cock even further into his.

“Fuck, Gus, how did you— unnNGH!” I groaned as he loosened the force of gravity between us just enough so he could undo my jeans and slip his hands down my underwear.

“Mmhm… I guess there’s no need for lube today, huh Petey?” he smirked as his hand wrapped around my cock and rolled a thumb over its head, sending shivers of pleasure through my body.

“I…”

“Shhh, you know it embarrasses me when you tell me I’m better than anyone you’ve ever had before,” Gus teased and I chuckled through labored breath. Even in another dimension he never ceased to make me laugh. “Now shut up and cum.” He looked directly at me with his beautiful hazel eyes as he seductively bit his lip. His new dominant manner sent me over the edge.

“Gus, I’m— aaAGH!“ I was cut short as my center of gravity shifted from his body to the alley wall behind me. As I stayed glued to the wall a few feet above the ground, Gus dropped to his knees. He began pumping faster, sending wave after wave of ecstasy from the tip of my dick to the end of my toes as his hand slipped over the head of my cock to its base again and again in what seemed like an impossibly fast pace. Before I knew it every muscle in my body clenched, and a rush of warm cum shot directly out of my dick into Gus’ mouth. I made eye contact with him as he swallowed and pumped every last drop of cum into his mouth. He squeezed from the base of my shaft all the way up to the tip, milking me of any remaining cum I had left.

I let my head hang back, sweat rolling up my forehead and dripping against the wall. Moments later, my body was detached from the wall and I slumped into Gus’ arms. I rested my head on his chest and focused in on the sound of his heavy breathing.

“Do you need me to finish you?” I asked quietly, suddenly becoming hyper-aware of the fact that we were mere paces from the busy streets of New York this whole time.

“No need,” Gus said as he smiled at me. I looked down and cum was seeping through his well-fitting khakis. He could read the astonished look I had on my face, because he immediately said, “Never knew watching your cute O-face alone could make me cum, but to be fair your cute face is pretty darn powerful. I mean, it did tame New York City’s _favorite_ superhero.”

“Shut up!” I laughed as I jokingly pushed him away.

“Fine then! I’ll just go!” He said as he dramatically pivoted on his heel.

“I take it back! Just come hold me again. I’ve missed you.” It just slipped out. And it made me realize that this was not my Gus. For a moment there, the intimacy, the flirtation, the humor, they all made me think that I had my Gus back. But it wasn’t him..

“What? You can’t go two days without seeing me before missing me now? I mean—” Gus teased before I cut him off.

“Gus, there’s something I should tell you. I’m not Peter.” I blurted out. He just stood there, confused. “Well, I am, but not the Peter you know.” Still no response. “I’m Peter from another dimension. I’m another Peter.” His mouth open slightly and his eyes widened with shock. “Let me explain!” And I did. I told him everything there was to know. All the way from getting my powers, Uncle Ben dying, the Superhuman Civil War from my dimension, meeting Gus, falling in love, the unfortunate ending to that, and lastly coming here. It took a lot longer than one sentence, though, and by the time I was done my feet were aching from standing. I awkwardly squatted across from Peter. “I’m sorry, my feet are just _killing_ me.” Without saying anything, Gus and I both rose into the air and were gently placed next to each other on the edge of the building that bordered one side of the alley. I looked confused and Gus just gestured towards his hands and said,

“That was thanks to the freak lab accident that happened in _my_ dimension.” I chuckled, happy that he was able to see the humor in the insane coincidences that had led up to us sitting there in that moment. “So all of _that_ …” He waited to make sure I knew what he was talking about. When it became clear I didn’t, he gestured to the cum stain in his pants. I turned beet red and looked down.

“Yes, _that_.”

“All of _that_ was you, then, not the Peter I know?” Fear and regret instantly filled every part of my body.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry. I wasn’t even thinking about whether or not you would have been comfortable with that, consensually and all. I just thought of being with you again, or not you, but my Gus, and I got caught in the moment. I seriously should have—“

“Stop right there! It’s okay! It’s actually… more than okay. Like that was kind of the hottest thing that’s ever happened to me. I love y— my Peter I mean, but he’s never been willing to be that… submissive before.” I blushed so hard I swear my whole body must have been red. I looked down at my feet as I said,

“My Gus has never been that dominant, and I guess I never knew that I’d like that so much…” I glanced up at Gus’ eyes, and I could see the sexual hunger in them. My dick stirred to life, but I pushed its intrusive (and unbelievably tempting) thoughts out of my head.

“So how are you gonna get back?” Gus asked.

“I haven’t thought much about it, honestly. I sort of just came here on an impulse to find an alive version of you and, well, here you are.”

“But you are going back, right? I mean, Petey— Sorry, I meant Peter. Petey is what I call, nevermind, you know what I mean. But, anyways, Peter, I know you’ve been through a lot, and I’m really sorry about that, but Petey has a life here in this body that you’re in now. And I don’t want to put this all on you, but he’s in some other dimension with absolutely no experience with the things that we’re used to as superheroes. He’s not used to adapting to new situations, let alone with his own set of superpowers in your body now. I know Petey and I know that right now he’s more scared than he’s ever been in his entire life. He needs to get back. _I_ need him back.”

“Of course, no, I never meant…” How could I have been so selfish? This was about way more than just me. Somewhere out there, the Peter with the perfect life is in way over his head and that’s my fault. I never should have risked hurting any version of me. “You’re right. I need to get back home right now, too.”

“I don’t mean to sound like an asshole, it’s just that if you know anything about the kind of apparently dimension-crossing love between Gus Myers and Peter Parker, you know how important it is for me to get my Peter Parker back.”

“What’s the deal between you and your Peter, anyways? I thought you and Kitty were dating.” Gus took a deep breath.

“You told me yours, so here’s mine, I guess. The Epic Love Story of Gus Myers and Peter Parker.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're gonna take a change of pace next chapter and learn all about how Peter and Gus met up and completely different circumstances in "The Epic Love Story of Gus Myers and Peter Parker"! Warning: It's just an excuse to write really cute early relationship flirting and milestone fluff.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed the smutty break we took from all the crazy drama. I thought we deserved it after chapter and chapter of angst and crazy plot.
> 
> Let me know how you like it! Thanks for reading!


	32. The Epic Love Story of Gus Myers and Peter Parker

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GUS-2'S POV!!!!!! Keep in mind he's talking to Peter while saying all of this!

It all started about two years ago, I think? Yeah, just before the whole Astro thing happened. Because of the merger between Eastside and MSST, the school had extra funds to throw around, so they started this sophomore year spring break bonding trip thing. That year the trip was going to be to the Grand Canyon, and Petey and I were randomly assigned as roommates. Since this was before I became Astro, I wasn’t really that popular or paid attention to. Kitty and I were dating, we have been since middle school, but Flash didn’t really follow us around since I had nothing to offer anyone, socially, I mean. I think I knew I was gay back then before the spring break trip, but I didn’t _know_ know, ya know?

Anyways, that all changed that trip. Kitty and I spent all our time together on the bus and at the airport and on the plane and pretty much the whole way there, but once we finally got to the hotel, Petey and I met for the first time in our room. God, he was so cute. The second I walked into the room he turned beet red, kinda like you were earlier when we were talking about all of that stuff we just did. He told me later that he had always kind of admired me from afar, but the second he realized that I was his roommate he had no clue how he was gonna make it through the trip without making it obvious that he liked me or embarrassing himself at some point. Petey wasn’t out either back then, but he said he had already realized and known that he was bi after he and Ned were watching _Brokeback Mountain_ cause they thought it was a cowboy action movie and he got a boner during that first tent sex scene.

Sorry, getting back on track! For the first half of that trip Petey and I just went our separate ways, coexisting within the same room. But one day, after a big day of hiking through the canyon, I told Petey that he could shower first since I was gonna go hang out with Kitty in her room for a while. After he went into the shower, I decided that it’d be best if I didn’t track canyon dust all around the hotel and into Kitty’s room, so I waited on my bed outside the bathroom in just a towel. Well, Petey must have thought that I was gone cause he walked out wearing nothing at all. We both screamed, but for a split second he couldn’t take his eyes off of my shirtless body and I couldn’t take mine off of his, well, everything. He ran back into the bathroom while I apologized profusely about the misunderstanding, but when he walked back out he was definitely maneuvering his hands so they covered up something making a just noticeable bulge in his towel. I, on the other hand, had a massive boner from the incident and, despite my best efforts, there’s no way that he didn’t notice as we walked past each other.

That night, right after one of our teachers came around to make sure we were turning all the lights out and getting to bed, I apologized to him again. Somehow, the conversation slowly turned into, well, everything and anything. I swear we must have been up until 4AM just lying in separate twin beds, a few feet of floor space between us, talking. The next morning we got breakfast together, walked along the rim of the canyon together, and did just about everything we could together. Kitty even made a joke that I had found a new boyfriend to replace her. Little did she know…

As I was saying, Petey and I spent a lot of the trip together after that. And at night, that small glimpse I had of him naked filled every corner of my thoughts. One time, I even had to step into the bathroom to help myself get them out of my system, if you know what I mean. It felt good and got the job done, but I still couldn’t stop thinking about him.

On the second to last day, we were scheduled to go rafting down the Colorado, however it was pouring so hard outside you couldn’t see past ten feet ahead of you. Most everyone was just staying back at the hotel and playing board games and hanging out, but Petey suggested we go out and get a rare look at the Grand Canyon with nobody else there. We were the only people on the shuttle to the rim, and when we got out at the parking lot there wasn’t a car in sight. Petey and I had a poncho each, but by the time we got to the edge, our sneakers were instantly soaked through and his hair was already matted to his head in these dark curls that I always loved.

“You can’t see a thing!” Petey shouted above the roar of rain.

“But come on! Look at this!” I flung my arms out into the horizon above in front of us. Large masses of water poured down from clouds that were so close to us it felt like we could have touched them with one jump. “I mean, have you ever seen a waterfall get created from one rainstorm?!” I gestured down right behind his feet where the off flow of water from the ledge of the canyon was pouring out over the ledge, creating a giant, cascading waterfall.

“I guess it is pretty cool!”

“Just look at how strong this current is!” I moved towards the temporary mini-river and put my hand in it. Water gushed all the way up my sleeve and splashed in my face. “Okay, probably not my best idea, but still, point proven! Anyways, why don’t we—”

I heard Petey yelp from behind me and I turned around just in time to catch him as he slipped on a wet rock underneath him. It was like something out of a movie. He was bent back, his back parallel to the ground, and I was holding him up by wrapping my arms around his torso. My face was a few inches above his, water dripping off of my nose down onto his cheeks. That’s when he leaned in and tried to kiss me. It must have been the shock combined with the closeted-gay nerves because I instantly dropped him onto the wet ground. I dropped to my knees immediately after doing so and lifted him up from the ground, then put him down again so he was resting on my legs. I bent over him and asked if he was okay or not. That’s when he said,

“Now I am.”

The three words that rocked my world. We stayed there for what felt like eternity just staring into each other’s eyes. We both knew what had to happen, it was just a matter of who was going to do it first. We ending up both leaning into each other at the same time, causing the most romantic kiss that has _ever_ happened. Petey always says that “ _The Notebook_ nothing on us!”

Not only were we lucky enough that all of this happened while we were on a minimally supervised spring break trip as roommates, but because we were dumb enough to roll around in mud in the pouring rain making out for an hour, we both got terrible colds and the nurse that came along on the trip said that we were too sick to participate in any of the last day activities. Neither of us were complaining, though. I mean, you can imagine what we got up to when we were ordered not to leave our room all day.

When we both got home, it became clear that we had feelings for each other, feelings that I never had for Kitty. I knew that I had to break up with her and come forward with the truth, but that meant coming forward with the _full_ truth, which meant telling my family that I was gay also. I told Petey I needed a few weeks to get ready and he understood, but then, within a few weeks, BAM! Astro powers. So I needed a few more weeks to get those under control and figure out what that was going to be like. And Petey understood, again. And then I decided to go public with being Astro. The stress of keeping that a secret from everyone in my life (except Petey) was growing to be too much, and I had to get it off my shoulders. And, once again, Petey understood. Because he was dealing with his own secret, being bi. So the same day that I organized a press conference with my new friend Tina Stark, more popularly known as Iron Woman, and announced that I was Astro, Petey came out to his Aunt and Uncle. From there we both thought we’d let the initial shock blow over and then I’d come out and break up with Kitty, but we realized that being a superhero in the public eye was something far different from just being a superhero. I mean, I was a celebrity. _Am_ a celebrity. And Kitty is NYC’s premier teen superhero’s girlfriend. We have pieces written about how we’re couple goals on BuzzFeed. It soon grew to be a lot for both Petey and Kitty. I didn’t think about how my decision would effect either of them.

And Kitty, I mean, I love her. I do. She’s my best friend. She’s been my best friend since we were in elementary school. But I never loved her and don’t love her the way I love Petey. But at the same time, I dragged her into the spotlight with me. She always put up with it for me since she knew it was never my fault or my intention. She’s been really great with that. But I know it’s not the life she likes to live. And I couldn’t give her a life in the public eye then humiliate her by braking up with her, too. I couldn’t do that to Petey, either. As much as it’s screwed up, the narrative of the heartbroken straight girl whose closeted gay boyfriend cruelly comes out and breaks up with her is still so prevalent, and I knew that if I came out, Petey would be the “other man” villain of the story, I would become an asshole, and Kitty would just get more unwanted attention for being a victim. And it’s not only that I don’t want the public to hate me. If people don’t trust me because they think I’m an asshole, I can’t help them as easily as I can now. But, more importantly, I don’t want my entrance into the LGBTQ+ community to paint a bad picture for that very same community.

After thinking this over for a while, I decided that it would be best if I just stayed in the closet. I know it’s unfair to lead Kitty on like this, but I’m planning on breaking up with her in a few months when college decisions come out and blame it on “college putting a potential strain on the relationship”. I’m hoping that’s common enough of a break-up reason that the press will just roll with it and forget about Kitty now that she’s out of the picture. And Petey and I, I mean, we find our times together. Like that moment we just had. Typically after school we always sneak away and spend the afternoon together. Sometimes I sneak through his bedroom window late at night and we’ll have sleepovers. One day soon I hope I can come out with it all. I thought the secret of me being Astro was what I needed to get off my chest, but I realize now it was always the fact that I’m gay.

Regardless, with all this angst and confusion, Petey really is the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me. I know you lost your… me, I guess, but I really don’t want to lose my you. So whaddya say we figure out how to get you back home?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you liked this little look into how Peter and Gus came to be in another dimension!! Next chapter we'll get back to the main story.
> 
> Let me know what you think!


	33. Ms. Stark If You're Nasty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BACK TO PETER'S POV!!!

“I’m all for getting home and getting you _your_ Peter back, but there’s one problem…”

“Oh no.” Gus said, fearing the worst. After hearing what he and his Peter had gone through, I understood why he was so desperate for things to go back to normal and why any hitch in the plan scared him so much.

“The device I used to get here… I think it’s back in my dimension. With your Peter.”

“What do you mean?”

“It was this machine thing that I held in my hands, and when I activated it, I just swapped bodies with the Peter of this dimension! So I’m guessing that anything I was holding in that moment, my body kept on holding, which means your Peter is now holding it… using my body.” A thought crossed my mind briefly. When I activated the device, it felt like the entire lab exploded around me. Could it have been possible that when I activated the device, it worked and sent my consciousness to this dimension, but simultaneously killed my own body, leaving this Peter’s consciousness in a carcass? I pushed it aside and decided not to tell Gus, knowing it would only throw him off.

“Okay, well, hm. Where did you activate it? Maybe if we went back there the device could have transported itself to this dimension?” That was the Gus I fell in love with in my dimension. He always looked on the bright side of things.

“It’s worth a shot! It was just up at the Avengers Facility.”

“You mean Avengers Tower?” Gus pointed towards midtown and I followed it to see the Avengers Tower from my dimension, just as active as it was before Mr. Stark moved his base of operations upstate.

“Nonono. It’s this big facility place upstate where the Avengers of my universe all hung out.”

“That _definitely_ doesn’t exist here. Do you know how to find it without it actually existing? Like where it’s located?”

“Uhhh… I think it was an old Stark warehouse that Mr. Stark converted.”

“Mr. Stark? Wow things really are different where you come from. Here, we only have Tina Stark. Speaking of…” A streak of lavender and silver crossed the sky above us. Gus quickly whipped his hand out in the direction of the object and it started slowing down. He closed his hand slightly and I could tell that it was difficult for him to fight the force of the jet repulsers pushing whatever it was through the air, but he eventually succeeded. The object came soaring towards us until it crashed violently onto the roof across the way from where we were perched. That’s when I realized that it wasn’t any object, it was an Iron Man suit! Or, Iron Woman suit, really.

“Good one Gus…” A woman’s sly and raspy voice said through the robotic speakers of the suit. “Too bad you didn’t see _this_ coming!” She whipped her hand up and shot a repulser blast directly at Gus, but his reflexes were faster. He waved his hand out in front of him and the blast deflected off of what seemed like air and into a brick wall.

“Now is that any way to greet an old friend?” Gus asked as he levitated Tina across the alleyway onto our roof.

Her face cover seamlessly retracted into the helmet so Tina could give Gus and annoyed look.

“It is when he pulls you out of the air mid-flight, giving you full-body whiplash. Do you know what that’s like, full-body whiplash? Imagine being on a rollercoaster right when it gets really fast when you don’t expect it and then your neck never feels comfortable for the next week except it’s all over your body.”

“Uhhh… yes, that’s whiplash. So I assumed that’s what happens with ‘full-body whiplash’.” Gus said with a jokingly condescending tone.

“Shut up, dweeb. What do you want? Oh, hey, what’s up Peter?” Tina said as she leaned past Gus to get a look at me. “Why does he look like a meerkat? Gus, what did you do to him? Did you break him again? I told you, no telling secret boyfriends about top-secret government secrets. Just because they’re both secrets doesn’t mean one has the right to know about the other.” It was scary how similar she and Mr. Stark were.

“That’s exactly what I need you for. Peter, here,” Gus patted my back as he said, “isn’t our Peter?”  
“What do you mean he ‘isn’t our Peter’? Of course he isn’t ‘our’ Peter. He’s literally 17. I have no desire to be in any relationship with him, especially if you’re part of the package. Anyways, there’s a little issue going on on my end called ‘lesbianism’, maybe you’ve heard of it?”

“That’s not what I mean! I mean, he’s from another dimension.”

“Oooo, now the full-body whiplash is worth it!” She exclaimed as she gently pushed herself off the ledge of the building, her repulsers automatically turning on with her. She hovered in front of me, not wavering at all in the wind. The repulsers themselves seemed to use a form of technology I had never seen Mr. Stark use back in my dimension. They were by far more sleek and efficient. “Okay, scan done.” I snapped out of my train of thought. “I don’t know what to tell you, Gus. He looks totally fine to me.”

“It’s not me that’s not fine!” I butted in. “It’s… me.”

“Wow. Revolutionary words.” Tina snickered.

“Like, my body is from this dimension. It’s the body of the Peter you know. It’s just my consciousness has been swapped with the consciousness of the Peter of this dimension.” Immediately a purple laster beam swept over my body.

“Interesting… his body is the same as your Peter but his brain patterns are completely different…” Tina said to Gus.

“That… that’s _literally_ what I just said.”

“How do we get him back?” Gus asked Tina.

“Ughhhh do we _have_ to send him home? Think of all the science we can do with him!”

“But what about _my_ Peter?”

“But Gus… the s c i e n c e.” Gus gave Tina a death stare. “Joking! Joking, obviously. Well, how’d you get here, Peter-2?” It was weird hearing Tina call me that. To me, they had all been Gus-2 and Peter-2, the other ones. But I guess I was the other for them.

“There was this weird device that ran off of a trans-dimensional energy ball thing and I activated it and then I was here in this body. I came here cause I thought I could get the Gus of my dimension back. He, um, passed away where I’m from. Anyways, we were thinking that maybe there’s some leftover energy at where the Avengers Facility of my dimension is, but I don’t know how to get there.”

“Oh please, that’s the least of our worries. Where’s this facility located? … Also sorry about your Gus.” Her comment threw me off guard. Everything about talking about Gus that casually threw me off guard.

“Yeah, uh, no, it’s fine, I, um, as I was telling Gus before, I think Mr. Stark, or my Ms. Stark, I guess, converted it from—“

“WAIT! I’m a dude in your dimension?? The Tina Stark fuckboi energy is trans-dimensional! Pepper’s gonna love this.”

“You’re still together with Pepper in this dimension? Is he a boy here, though?” I asked.

“EW! Tina Stark, liking boys???? Didn’t you hear me earlier? My girl-loving energy is trans-dimensional too.” Tina made a ‘V’ with her index and middle finger and wiggled her tongue in the middle of it.

“Okay, we’re in high school, reel it in.” Gus chimed in.

“I roomed next to you and Peter when I took you both into space for a weekend, me making a pussy-licking symbol is nothing compared to what I know you both are capable of.”

Gus and I looked at each other and blushed, thinking about what had happened moments before we intercepted Tina. “I know that look. That’s the sex look. Please, say no more. It’s weird enough that I’m able to intercept a sex look between two teenagers, I can’t know details about it. Anyways, Avengers Facility? Probably converted from the Stark storage facility I have upstate, right? In this dimension, I converted it into a training camp for young heroes. That’s where I taught Gus all his tricks! Gus, do that gravity tunnel thing we figured out and hop us on over to the training camp.”

Gus whisked his arms upwards and suddenly he, Tina, and I were soaring through the air. The world was moving so quickly past us that I couldn’t make out anything beyond a bunch of blurs, but, strangely, there was no wind blowing in our faces.

“Gus, what’s up with the whole no wind thing?”

“I just repelled all air from this tunnel we’re traveling along to create a vacuum so we could speed through, but kept us traveling within the pocket of air surrounding us when we took off so we still have some stuff to breathe off of on our way there. And by there, I mean here!” My feet gently placed themselves onto a concrete tarmac as my surroundings went from a series of blurs to a full-fledged superhero school. All around me different heroes — some I recognized, some entirely new — were mock-fighting each other in hand-to-hand and projectile combat. Some people with more brutal powers were tearing apart Ultron-bots in one section of the camp.

“Tina! So kind of you to join us!” A 9-foot-tall robot loomed over us. The original Ultron.

“Let me guess, Ultron never went crazy in this dimension?” I said to Tina and Gus.

“Crazy? I’m sorry, unless you call being enthusiastic about superpower nurturing crazy, I’m definitely not crazy by any normal standards.” Ultron chirped in. I shrugged.

“Honestly, after everything, this barely phases me. Anyways, I’m not sure exactly where I was in my dimension when I activated the device, so I’m not sure—“

“Oh, don’t worry about that,” Tina interrupted, “Ultron, any strange energy anomalies? Specifically trans-dimensional?”

“So funny you should ask! Yes, just the other day one of our senior heroes-in-training Kate Bishop found this strange energy source in her room. It kind of just… fizzled into existence, she said. Let me take you to where we’ve stored it.” A short stroll into a nearby lab building brought me face-to-face with a familiar glowing red ball of energy.

“That’s it! We just have to make the machine it was put into back in my dimension and get the settings just right!”

“And you think that’ll bring my Peter back?” Gus said with earnest. The small twinge of hope in his voice killed me. It reminded me of the hope I felt when I thought I would be able to get Gus back by coming here. Technically, I did get him back. Just not _my_ him.

“Yeah! I think, at least. Do you think we could do it, Ms. Stark?”

“Ugh, please, just call me Tina. I’m aware on the older side of the roster of superheroes. I don’t need the formalities that come along with it. Ultron, can you send my suit any data you collected about the energy thing?”

“Right away!” Ultron chirped. His undying positivity was uneasy to watch. Tina’s helmet covered her head in an instant.

“Ultron, are you sure these are correct?”

“Double-checked them myself. I know. I was surprised, too.”

“Tina, what is it?” Gus asked her. Her helmet retracted again and she looked directly at me.

“It seems like this little ball of energy’s main purpose _isn’t_ to transport people from different dimensions. It’s more of a dimension… holder, of sorts. The machine that you found it in must have manipulated it into transporting matter between dimensions, but it mostly just holds onto the very fabric of reality that all of the dimensions rest on.”

“Okay, but why is this relevant to me?”

“Basically, from these readings, I’m getting that there’s multiple realities where Gus is still alive and well.”

“Well, we know _that_ already.” Gus said.

“But I think _your_ Gus is in there, too.” Tina said back to me.

“How? He…”

“I know he died, but according to these readings, when someone’s body dies, their consciousness is just uploaded onto this giant fabric of the multiverse in general. They’re not alive, and they’re not conscious, and they can’t be physically found anywhere, but they’re out there.”

“Wait. So what you’re saying is…”

“What I’m saying is, I think I can get your Gus back.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it's been about a month and a half now, I'm so sorry I've kept you all waiting so long! It's really getting comments and feedback to my writing that motivates me to write more, so if you like it, please just let me know what you like about it. Or if you hate it, let me know what you want from it in the future! Really, just any comments fuel my writing process!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading. It's crazy to think there are people out there that actually wait for new chapters to be posted.


	34. The Return

For a moment, the world froze around me. I had just heard the words I’ve wanted to hear for the past few months of my life. I could get Gus back. Everything came back into focus and I only had one thought on my mind:

“How do we get him back?! What do you need?!” I was frantic.

“There’s just one problem…” Tina said. My stomach dropped.

“What…”

“His consciousness is stored in this source of energy, but not his body. We don’t have anywhere to put him unless we kick someone else out of their body.” My eyes immediately darted towards Gus. His eyes widened and Tina caught onto my thought process. “No! We are not sending anyone’s consciousness into the reality void so you can get him back. We need to find an empty shell of a human body.”

“Like… a dead body?”

“No, bodies die for a reason. His consciousness wouldn’t be able to bring a body back to life, he would just be shot right back into oblivion. We need a body capable of living but with no one inside. Also, preferably someone you’re attracted to. Also someone Gus would be cool with living inside of. Basically, we would need a clone of our Gus.” My heart sank. That was the end of the trail. It was fun to get excited while lasted.

“Oh. Okay. Um… I guess you could just send me back home, then.” I wiped the tears forming in my eyes away.

“Wait, I’m confused, why are you giving up now? We’re so close to getting your Gus back.” Gus-2 said to me.

“Yeah, only if we can clone you!”

“Have you… _not_ been cloned yet?”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“My bio teacher, Dr. Miles Warren, he stole my DNA and made a bunch of clones of me so they could commit crimes for him. Those were a wild few weeks of my life; watch out for any bio teachers you have. But anyways, we literally have a dozen clones of me sitting in Avengers Tower in hibernation tubes after we found them waiting to be activated in his lab that we busted.”

“So you weren’t being sarcastic when you said we would need a clone of Gus?!” I said to Tina.

“Not at all, I’ve been figuring out how to transfer consciousnesses between this energy ball and into human bodies this entire conversation. If we head over to the tower now, we should be able to start right up when we get there.”

“Then why are we still here? Gus, do your gravity tunnel thing again!”

In less then a minute, we found ourselves on the quinjet landing pad of Avengers Tower. Tina guided us into the building and we took a quick elevator ride down into a subterraneous part of the tower that I never knew existed.

“Just back here, you two.” Tina walked towards a blank cement wall. Her suit’s glove retracted, leaving her hand bare, as she pressed her hand against the wall. “Pepper is the love of my life.” Tina said into the wall. Suddenly, the wall fell into the floor and an opening was made for us into a lab.

“I’m sorry, ‘Pepper is the love of my life’ is your secret voice activation key?” Gus said.

“Shut up! Never tell Pepper I just did that.”

“It’s adorableeee…” Gus teased. Tina gave him a death stare. “So here are the other ‘me’s?” Gus looked up towards seven glass cylinders that were all a little larger than a human body. Each one had a variety of tubes and wires coming in and out of them and the glass was foggy, but you could make out the outline of Gus’ body through the fog.

“Yup! Peter-2, take your pick! Which one are you most attracted to?”

“My… pick? Are they different at all? I feel kind of weird picking which Gus I’d rather have over the other.”

“They’re all _literally_ the same as I am. She’s just trying to make you uncomfortable.”

“Gus! Let me prank your boyfriends from other dimensions! Ugh, you’re no fun.”

“Wait, will my Gus have your powers now?” I asked Gus-2.

“He shouldn’t, right Tina? I mean, since my powers are more energy-based and not so much genetics-based, Dr. Warren was never able to clone my powers as well as my body. A lot of his evil plan was just to ruin my reputation and use my fame to get him what he wanted through clones of myself that he manipulated into helping him. He only ever tried to replicate my powers once, and he had to give his clones special suits that used magnetic waves to control the gravity of objects. So, yeah, no I don’t think so.”

“And he won’t be evil, right?”

“No, Dr. Warren put all of his evil onto them after he activated them. He mind controlled them through some crazy type of light therapy he developed. Basically, all we’re giving you is a copy of my body for you to upload _your_ my mind into. Wow, I can’t believe I just said those words.”

“All ready for the upload!” Tina shouted from across the room. “He’s gonna pop out of the tube on the far right!”

I quickly walked right up to the tube, looking at Gus’ sleeping face through the glass.

“Why is there no fog on this tube?” I asked.

“We’re activating the body first so that we have a living shell to put Gus into, so the tube has to heat up to a livable temperature, hence, no fog.” I watched as Gus’ skin turned from grey and cold to pink and living. He took a breath and my heart skipped a beat.

“Was that— does that mean—“

“No, he’s not in there yet. The body’s alive, which is good, but it’s basically just living because a computer is making it breathe and making its hard beat. Uploading the consciousness in 3, 2, and… 1!” Tina frantically typed into a keyboard on the other side of the room as the lights flickered on and off. “Forgot to mention! We might temporarily shut off the East Coast’s power! Sorry everyone!” Tina hit the space bar with vigor and spun around towards the tubes to watch her handiwork. The lights brightened for a brief second and then everything went dark. All I could hear was a hissing noise as the tube in front of me opened. I could hear the body breathing inside the tube. Calm. Steady.

“Is he awake?” I asked softly, as if not wanting to startle him.

“He should be… Let me just… Oh! So dumb of me! I forgot to wake the body up from the medically-induced coma! Here we go!” I heard the jabs of a few keys and then—

 

GUS’ POV

 

—happening to me?! My eyes burst open only to be greeted by total darkness. Had I gone blind? I suddenly realized that I wasn’t curled up in bed anymore, I was standing up. I stumbled forward before falling off the ledge of something. I braced my body for impact but a pair of arms caught me.

“Hello? Who’s there!” I called out.

“Oh my god, Gus, it’s you.” It was Peter.

“Peter? What are you doing back? Don’t those people need your help?” Peter held me close to him and I could feel his body shake as he sobbed into me. “Peter, what’s wrong?” I stood up across from where I thought his body was in the darkness and placed my hands on either one of his cheeks. “Hey, what’s wrong? Did something happen out there? It’s okay.” I wrapped my arms around him and held him close. He felt smaller than he did a few minutes ago when he left, like he had lost some of his muscle mass. “Peter, let’s turn the lights back on. If you’re gonna cry, you have to let me see your cute crying face.” A bright white light emerged from the darkness above us, illuminating our surroundings. I wasn’t in our bedroom in Rome. I was in a lab of some sorts. Peter was in front of me, but wearing a completely different outfit than what he was wearing before. Behind Peter was a woman who looked like Iron Man’s sister in a purple and silver version of an Iron Man suit. She waved nervously towards me. I looked to my right and looked straight into a mirror. But then the mirror moved and waved at me, too.

“Uh, oh.” Peter said softly between sniffles.

“Peter… why is there another me standing right there?”

“You should probably sit down…” The Tony Stark lookalike said as she rolled a chair towards me. I sat down tentatively. The other me awkwardly stood in the corner, trying not to make eye contact with me. Peter pulled up a chair of his own and sat across from me.

“Gus,” he said as he took my hands in his, “that night in Rome, when I had to figure out what that explosion was about, when I came back… I found you dead.” Peter paused, expecting me to react, but I didn’t know what to say. He continued, “A while after that happened, I was fighting this guy who had a device that could let people travel between dimensions and, when I touched the thing that powered it, I saw you in a different dimension, happy and alive. So I took whatever chance I could to get you back and used the device to come to that dimension, which is where we are now. But it turns out that it didn’t transport _me_ here, but just my consciousness. So now it’s me but in the body of a Peter that never became Spider-Man. Instead, in this dimension, _you_ got a different set of superpowers and became a different superhero of your own. But the thing is, we’re still together here, just you’re not out (and kind of dating Kitty) so it’s a little more top secret. Also you’re kind of a celebrity. Anyways, we found the thing that powered the device and figured out a way to bring you back and here you are! We just took your consciousness and uploaded it into a clone body of the Gus of this dimension.” Peter gestured towards the other me standing in the corner. I sat there in stunned silence.

“So you really _are_ a twink.” I finally blurted out.

“I’m sorry, what?” Peter replied.

“I’ve always wondered if you had no spider-powers jacking you up if you would be a twink under all of it. And you are. It’s living proof sitting right in front of me! Twink looks good on you.”

“I know, right?” The other me said from the corner. He walked a little bit closer.

“Don’t get me wrong,” I continued, “I’m a big fan of twink Peter, but you have to _see_ my Peter. I mean, he is ripped. And the things he can do with his spider-powers! He’s wildly flexible, you know.”

“I can only imagine! I mean, I don’t wanna brag, but I have a pretty sexy power set of my own.”  
“What can you do??”

“I can control the force and center of gravity of any object on command,” Other me said as a pen flew from the table and fell onto his hand.

“Okay, very cool, but I feel like spider-powers are way hotter than gravity powers.”

“I wouldn’t be too cocky! Peter seemed to like it.” He nodded his head towards Peter.

“Wait, do you mean your Peter or my Peter?”

“Both.” I looked at Peter and his face was beet red and facing straight down into his lap. He gave the other me the evil eye.

“You hooked up with a me of another dimension?!” I shouted at Peter.

“I didn’t— It didn’t mean anything, I just missed you so much— and—“

“I’m not mad at you! This is insane!” I began laughing uncontrollably. “I’m sorry, it’s just… I remember feeling like I was dying ten minutes ago and now I’m in another dimension with my boyfriend who’s in another body of himself and with a copy of myself. And don’t forget the female version of Tony Stark over there! _And_ this is the second time I’ve been brought back from the dead! This kind of thing shouldn’t phase me anymore!”

“I’d just like to say, I know we haven’t talked at all since you came back from the dead but, wow, you hit the nail on the head with me. Except I feel like your ‘Tony Stark’ is more the male version of me, but tomato to-mah-to.” Female Iron Man interjected.

“What’s your name, then? Tina Stark?”

“OH! He nails it again! Gus, this back-from-the-dead-Gus is giving you a run for your Gus-money.”

“Wait,” I turned back to Peter, “Was he better than me?”

“What?”

“Don’t play dumb! You know what I’m talking about.”

“He wasn’t better or worse than you! He was kind of… exactly the same. But like, if you had gravity powers.”

“Okay, so he was better. You know, I can live with that. He has a boost that I could never have.”

“No he wasn’t! It was a fun moment, but I definitely like being the… special one in the relationship.”

“I’m sorry, did Peter-from-another-dimension just admit to having a kink for using superpowers on other people in bed?” Tina interrupted, “This is too much, even for me. Why are all of my friends teenage gay boys that only talk about their sex lives? I’m gonna go work on that machine to get you both back to your home dimension. Have fun talking about sex! Oh, and Gus! There’s some clothes for you on the desk over there!” Tina left the room, leaving two me’s and one Peter.

Peter stood up and tugged me upwards with him, embracing me in a giant hug.

“I’ve missed you so much.”

“Me too. I love you.”

“I love you, too.” I broke away from the hug and slipped the pair of jeans and t-shirt over the underwear that I woke up in.

“Wait, so where’s your Peter?” I asked other me.

“His consciousness was swapped with your Peter, so he’s back in your Peter’s body in your dimension.” I could hear the nervousness in his voice.

“We’ll be out of your hair in no time. I’m sure your Peter will get back to you safely.” I walked towards him and gave him a hug. It was weird, hugging myself. I kept holding onto him as I leaned my face away from his so I could look into my own eyes. “Have you ever wanted to know…”

“… what it would be like…” Other me continued what I was saying.

“… to have sex with yourself.” We said in unison. We leaned towards each other until our lips were about an inch apart, then we stole a quick glance at Peter before bursting out laughing. His jaw was on the floor.

“We got you so bad!” Other me said between gasps for air.

“Oh my god, your face, it was literally the funniest thing I had ever seen. You looked so horrified but at the same time so…”

“… turned on.” Peter blushed instantly as other me once again finished my sentence. “Oh my god, you were totally turned on by the thought of us having sex with one another!” He said.

“I was not! Just, like, for a second, a small part of me—“ I cut him off.

“AHAHAHAHAHAHA! You wanted me to have sex with myself!”

“Remind me to never let you meet a copy of yourself ever again. It’s not fun having you both gang up on me. How did you guys even know to do that in the first place?”

“Other me whispered it in my ear while we were hugging,” I explained, “Wow, we are a genius!” Other me and I high-fived and laughed in unison. Silence filled the room for a moment before I asked, “Wait, so you’re dating Kitty?”

“I, uh.. Yeah, I am. I mean, I’m secretly with Peter. My Peter, I mean. But we’ve been dating for a while now.”

“That’s so weird. Where I’m from we’re just best friends. She was the first person I ever came out to!”

“Really? Was she cool with it and everything?” I could tell this was causing him a lot of anxiety.

“Of course! She wasn’t gonna let that get in the way of being my best friend.” The other Gus was silent. “You know, Peter and I are also having a secret relationship back where I’m from. He hasn’t come out to his Aunt May ever since Uncle Ben and everything.”

“Wait, what happened to Uncle Ben?”

“I never told you?” Peter cut in.

“No, what happened?” He asked. Peter got silent.

“He, um, he passed away right after Peter got his spider-powers,” I said for him, “He hasn’t come out to May since he’s worried it would be too much for her since she also now knows he’s Spider-Man.”

“Oh my god, Peter, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s fine! No, really, it’s okay. Anyways, um, Gus, that’s not really the case anymore.”

“What do you mean?” I turned to him.

“After you died I told Aunt May about you. She’s been helping me a lot through losing you since she also lost the love of her life.”

“So does that mean…” I didn’t want to get too excited so I didn’t blurt it out.

“Yes, we can be disgustingly cute in public now. Pretty much everyone at school knows we were together anyways now, so it won’t be too much of a shock to them. Except for the fact that you’re alive again…”

“Oh my god, wait, everyone there thinks I’m still dead. What about my parents and my sister? Wait, how did they react when I died? Is everyone okay? I need to tell them I’m okay. Right now. Right now!” My breath was getting short. All of the messiness of coming back to life was finally hitting me. Peter was immediately by my side, wrapping his arms around me and firmly brushing my hair down with his hand to calm me down.

“Shhhh, it’s gonna be okay. It’ll all be okay. Listen, just be happy we have you back, okay? We can deal with all of those things one at a time, alright? But I got you now. It’s gonna be okay.” I could feel my breathing grow steadier. I still felt a giant knot in my stomach knowing all of the explaining I would have to do and people I would have to face when I got back home, but I felt a lot better knowing Peter was by my side through this. The other me was smiling off to the side.

“It’s really nice knowing Peter Parker takes the best care of Gus Myers in every dimension.” He said.

“I know,” I remarked as I stood back up straight, still holding onto Peter’s hand, “he gives literally the best—“

“—hugs in the history of the World.” The other me continued.

“Okay, can you guys stop that now, it’s freaking me out.”

“Stop what?” We asked simultaneously before laughing in the exact same way.

“This is too creepy, can we go home now?” Peter said.

“Actually, yes!” Tina burst back into the lab holding a sleek cylinder with one giant dial on top. A small window in the center of the object revealed a small, glowing, ball of red light.

“Wait, really?” Peter got out of his chair and walked towards Tina and the device. “It’s so much more compact than before.”

“Whoever built it before was smart, but I was able to easily do exactly what they did but way more compact. Also, with a few modifications of my own! It can be calibrated so it’ll only swap your consciousness with the other Peter’s but, Gus, it should be able to transport your whole body back to the other side. Here’s the important thing, once you get it over there, give it to the me with a penis ASAP. It can’t be trusted around you ever again, sorry not sorry, Peter.”

“No, I get it. I screwed up big time playing around with something like that. But I don’t regret it at all.” He squeezed my hand as he said that, nudging my shoulder with his head.

“Well, I guess this is it.” Other me said as he strolled towards Peter and I. Peter hugged him before he turned towards me.

“Thanks for helping me bring me, or, well, you, or, _us_ back to Peter.” I said.

“If anyone understands your feelings for him, it would be me.”

“Listen to me for a sec. I know you’ve lived _your_ life more than I have, but I’ve lived a life pretty darn close to yours, and I know things get so much easier and happier after you come out. I don’t want to force you to do anything you don’t want to, only do it if you feel ready and comfortable to, but Kitty’s a great person. She’s my best friend in my dimension. I’m sure she’d be hurt but she also loves you and cares about you and would never want you to be unhappy. And at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what the press says about all of this. I know you must be worried about public imagine and everything, but do what will make you happiest. Cause coming out was one of the best decisions I ever made, and it’s what made me happiest.” He just hugged me tight, then started leaning in for a kiss before we both interrupted ourselves with laughter again.

“Not funny, guys. I’m not gonna fall for it a second time.” Peter mumbled. I wrapped my arm around his and held his hand.

“I think we’re ready, right?”

“Yeah, I think so, too.”

“Okay, I’ve already done all the right settings. All you have to do is press down on the knob and BAMMO! You’ll be back home and we’ll get our Peter back. One more thing, I set the location settings so that you’ll both appear in your dimension’s Times Square. Wait you still have Times Square, right?” Peter and I both nodded. “Perfection! It’s all yours!” Tina handed Peter the device.

“Together?” Peter asked, holding the device out towards me with one hand while his other hand rested on top of the knob.

“Together.”

I placed my hand over his.

“3, 2, 1.” We pressed down. A short flash from the device took over my vision and I squeezed my eyes shut. For a moment, my body felt like it was being squeezed through a way-too-small tube, but a moment later it all came to a standstill.

I opened my eyes tentatively. Just like Tina had said we would, Peter and I were standing in the middle of Times Square. People were bustling past us and taking photos of the surrounding bright billboards.

“Do you think it worked?” I asked Peter.

“I’d say so.” Peter gestured up towards a monitor. A newscaster spoke in front of yellow caution tape blocking off an unrecognizable demolished structure.

“It’s been two days now since the mysterious explosion at the Avengers Facility in Upstate New York. Thankfully, no one was hurt, but the public is wary this might be the beginning of another alien invasion. Tony Stark himself has reassured us that the situation was an internal matter and has been dealt with appropriately.”

Peter turned to me and hugged me close. “That must have been from when I used the device to go see you! We did it. I’m back home, with you.” I could feel his tears dampen my the shoulder of my shirt. I wrapped my arms around him and brought him in close to me. It was weird. I understood that I had died and Peter had been alone for so long, but for me it felt like I was with him just a couple of hours ago. Still, I was so happy to see him. I rubbed his arms comfortingly, and that’s when I noticed he was twink no more.

“Ooo, hello, muscles!”

“Am I back in my own body?”

“Let me see. Here, close your eyes.” Peter did as I asked and I swung my fist at him as fast and hard as I could. With his eyes still closed, Peter caught my fist in midair, his spider-sense and strength. He opened his eyes and smiled at me.

“Still got it.” He said flirtatiously.

“Yeah, you do…” I leaned towards him and allowed our lips to meet each other’s. I hadn’t kissed him since I had come back from the dead and, even though we were fully about to have sex for the first time before I died, it felt like I had never felt his lips on mine before. In a way, I hadn’t. Not in this body, at least. I leaned into him further as our tongues slowly crept into one another’s mouths. I felt a quick tap on my shoulder. I pulled away from Peter and turned around to face a middle-aged woman holding the hand of a little girl who was hiding behind her leg. I instantly tensed up.

“Look, I’m all for you two being gay, I think it’s great, but I’d do this to any couple making out here. You’re in the middle of Times Square, and my kid is right here, and you two were getting very physical very fast. Do you mind at least just moving to not in the direct center of everything?” Peter and I laughed.

“Of course! We’re so sorry about that.” I said with a sigh of relief.

“Yeah, seriously, no worries at all.” 

“Thank you so much!” She said. Peter grabbed my hand and pulled me out from the crowd towards one of the streets leading out of Times Square. “I think we should find more privacy over here…” Peter said as he hooked his fingers through the belt loops of my pants and pulled my torso into his.

“Look like someone’s confident again now that they got their spider-powers back. You like being ‘the special one’?”

“Shut up! I haven’t kissed you for, like, three months now. Just put those cute lips of yours on mine!” I leaned into him but a young boy’s voice interrupted us, once again.

“Um… Excuse me? Do you guys know where I am?”

“You’re right in the middle of Times Sq—“ Peter began saying before he was cut short and his face widened with shock.

“Peter, what is it?” I turned around to look at the mystery boy. A spitting image of Peter, but about ten years younger, stood before us, wearing a padded uniform that scarily resembled Peter’s own Spider-Man costume. He peered at us through two eye holes planted in the center of what appeared to be a bike helmet that was made to cover the boy’s whole head and face.

“My name is Peter Parker and my Aunt always says ‘stranger danger’ but I’m really scared right now. Can you help me find my way back home?”

 

Officially introducing...

— ARC 2: DIMENSIONS —

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AND THERE WE HAVE IT!!! I know this was a l o n g one but we had a lot to pack in there! I hope you're all excited now that our Gus is finally back, but why is there a random 7-year-old version of Peter Parker running around?? Arc 2: Dimensions is just getting started!
> 
> Let me know what you've thought about the conclusion to the first part of this Arc (Peter's adventures in the other dimension) and what you hope happens in this second part! We have a long way to go...
> 
> As always, thank you so much for reading and please leave comments! The more comments I get, the more fueled I am to write more.


	35. Crash Landing

“Come. _ON!_ ” Peter exclaimed. I looked at him, startled. “I just went on a quest to another dimension and got my soulmate back from the dead but _of course_ there just _had_ to be a mini-me here now!”

“Okay, let’s just think this through, how do we know we weren’t just sent into mini-you’s dimension?” We both looked at the younger Peter standing in front of us.

“How did you get here?” We asked, simultaneously.

“Well, I was just swinging around one second and then the next second my body felt all squeeze-y and then I opened my eyes and I was somewhere new and I found you guys first cause my spider-tingle was tingling a ton when I got near you.”

“Okay, yeah, he’s definitely from another dimension.” I said to Peter.

“What’s a de-mansion?” Mini Peter said. Peter kneeled down to get onto his level.

“It’s like if someone copied the world you live in and made a new one, but it’s just a little bit different than the world you live in. I think you were accidentally brought into the dimension where we’re from. In this dimension, I’m you, but I’m a lot older, and I’m also Spider-Man.”

“Spider- _Man_? I’m just Spider-Kid.”

“That suits you a lot better,” Peter said with a smile. “We just came back from a different dimension, so I have a feeling that somehow screwed something up and brought you here. How old are you anyways?”

“Seven!” Mini Peter said proudly.

“Peter,” I said softly, tugging his sleeve up towards me. He stood up and leaned his ear towards me. “Just how much did our coming back here screw things up? Do you think there could be more things crossing over from other dimensions?”

“I’m not sure, but whatever happened, let’s try to figure it out without any Tony Stark help. We’ve bugged him enough lately and I think we have a decent amount of experience with inter-dimensional travel by now to try to figure out how to get mini-me here back.”

“You know, you’re pretty cute with kids.” I whispered as I wrapped my arms around his waist. Peter put his hand firmly on my chest.

“Gus, I love you, but there is a 7-year-old in front of us. A 7-year-old version of myself. I’m not trying to scar him by showing him an older version of himself making out with someone.”

“Fair…”

“Trust me, I haven’t been able to kiss you for the past months. There is nothing in the world I want more than kissing you right now, but we have to find somewhere where we can figure this out and hopefully send this little guy back home.” Peter turned right around to Mini Peter and clapped his hands excitedly. “Alright then! We’re gonna go on a little adventure and try to find a place for us to hang out while you’re here, sounds good?”

“Yeah!” Mini Peter said.

“You can swing, right?”

“Uh… duh! Why would I be Spider-Kid if I couldn’t swing.”

“I’m starting to feel very left out here.” I said jokingly.

“My friend Gus here doesn’t have any powers, so we’ll have to help him out as we swing around,” Peter said as he shed the civilian clothes he was wearing to reveal his Spider-Man suit under them. The other Peter must have kept wearing Peter’s suit while in Peter’s body.

“Laaaa-aaame!” Mini Peter shouted, following it up by sticking his tongue out at me.

“Yeah, he is pretty lame.” Peter said as he turned and winked at me. My heart skipped a beat. Peter pulled his mask over his head and wrapped his arm around my waist. “Follow my lead, Spider-Kid! I think I know a place that will work for us.” Peter leapt into the air and shot a web-line out, and Mini Peter immediately followed suit. He was quicker and more agile than Peter, but his swinging was definitely a little rough around the edges and involved a lot more spastic motions.

“You good back there?!” I shouted back to him.

“What’s it to you, lame brain?!” He shouted back. Peter burst into laughter.

“You need to put an end to this before this gets out of hand.” I said to Peter.

“Oh, there is no way I’m ever letting this _not_ get out of hand.”

“Also, what was the deal earlier with ‘my friend Gus’?

“Oh, yeah. That. I just… I don’t know if this me is bi, or straight, or gay, or whatever. And I don’t want me forcing this idea about what he should grow up to be at such a young age. And if he is bi or whatever, I don’t want him to be forced to face that realization right now when he’s seven. Sorry if it offended you at all, I just, yeah.”

“No, that makes total sense. Don’t worry about it.” I kissed his cheek through his mask.

We were swinging along 11th Avenue and had a clear view of Hudson River whenever we reached a gap between buildings. Spring was arriving early this year, and it was a surprisingly nice day. The sun was reflecting off of the water. And the buildings across the river in Hoboken too. And a small plane just above the horizon. It was moving much faster than a normal plane, though. And it had smoke streaming from behind it as it coursed through the sky.

“Peter, is that be something we should be concerned about?” Peter turned his head to look at the unidentified flying object, which changed its course so that it was now flying directly at us.

“Oh, shit. Hey Spider-Kid do you see that—“ Peter stopped mid-sentence and swiftly landed on the side of a building, still clinging onto me. “Spider-Kid?!” I looked behind us and Mini Peter was nowhere to be seen. Suddenly, we heard his high-pitched voice from above us.

“Big-me and lame-pants! There’s some smoking plane thing coming straight at us! Are you gonna help me catch it or what?”

“Wow, you’ve got a run for your money for best Spider-themed hero,” I teased at Peter.

“Shut up,” he responded as he scaled the building towards Mini Peter with me in tow, my arms around his neck. “Okay, let’s see, we’re gonna want to create a large web-net for whoever’s flying it to land into,” Peter asserted once we met up with little him.

“On it!” Mini Peter shouted and he began stringing web-lines between the building we were on and one across the street.

“I’m gonna go help him, but can you grab ahold of the web-lines I shoot over here and tie them around strong points, like the base of that water tower or any big, heavy, things you find?”

“You betcha.” Peter nodded at me and leapt from the roof to the opposite building. He was the bravest person I had ever known, and every time he took charge to save the day, I swooned and just wanted to furiously make out with him. Of course, saving the day was always a bit more important.

The first of Peter’s web lines shot onto the roof and I quickly plucked it from the ground where it had stuck and began wrapping it around any structurally sound objects I could find. The web lines continued to shoot over as the aircraft got closer and closer. It was moving too quickly and had too much smoke streaming from it to truly know if it was human or not, but whatever it was, it was definitely not a commercial flight.

“GUS! These are the last few lines we’ll be able to tie across here before it hits! Tie as many as you can up then get as far away as you can!” Meanwhile, Mini Peter was frantically tying the larger lines that Peter was shooting together, weaving them into an intricate net. For a 7-year-old, he was a pretty smart superhero. I mean, he was Peter Parker. There was no way Peter wasn’t the most obnoxiously smart 7-year-old in the world. Peter’s last web-line shot over and I hurriedly snatched it up and ran to the water tower to tie it to its base.

“Tie it fast then get out of there Gus!” I could hear Peter shout in the distance. The roar of the engines of the aircraft were getting louder. The web line was being pulled so tight that it kept slipping out of my fingers. I picked it up from the ground and firmly wrapped it a few times around my hand, determined to make it stretch enough to be tied to the water tower. Suddenly, I heard a loud crash from directly behind me. I spun around just in time to see what was clearly a spaceship barrel between the two buildings, tearing straight through the net and taking all of the net’s web lines with it. I didn’t have enough time to register that last fact before my whole body was pulled after the ship, flailing in the wind as my hand refused to separate itself from the web line. At this point, it was better than falling to my death forty stories above street level. A body slammed into mine and I looked to find that Mini Peter also got snared onto the ship. Only he was carefully climbing up one of the web lines to get to the ship. It was then that I noticed the entire back half of the ship had been torn off, revealing the inner compartment behind the cockpit. Before I knew it, Mini Peter was standing at the back of the ship, looking out back at me. I reached my free hand towards him as if to signal for him to reel me in, but he was more focused on something behind me. I craned my neck around to see Peter chasing after us as fast as his web-swinging could get him. Mini Peter shot a web line out past me, and it hit Peter square in the chest. With one good spider-powered yank., Mini Peter made Peter fly through the air towards the ship. On his way into the ship, Peter grabbed hold of my collar and yanked me inside with him.

I collapsed to the floor, appreciating the feeling of solid ground beneath me. Peter kneeled over me.

“You okay, hon?” My chest was heaving, but I managed to force out.

“There we go with the ‘hon’ again! I think you’re pretty darn smitten with me.” Peter laughed and kissed me on the forehead through his mask. “Hey, we’re still in a spaceship that’s careening through Manhattan. I think you have some more work to do.” I pushed Peter up onto his feet as I gently sat up. Determined, Peter moved towards the cockpit, where a rugged blonde guy with some stubble was doing his best at flying whatever garbage can of a spaceship we were in. Mini Peter was already engaged in a full-blown argument with him.

“What do you mean you were in space! You’re clearly not in space right now! You’re being dumb!” He shouted.

“You’re the one being dumb! Stop bullying me, kid!” Our mystery spaceman shouted back.

“It’s _Spider-_ Kid to you! And at least my spaceship isn’t a piece of junk!”

“Hey! Her name is the Milano and she’s a beauty! Leave her alone! Anyways, you don’t even have a spaceship right now so that argument makes literally no sense!”

Peter cut in quickly. “Okay! We can decide who has the better spaceship later! Let’s just deal with the fact that we’re on a crashing spaceship in the middle of New York City right now!”

“Wait. New York City as in Earth?? Earth is in Terran Earth? Am I on Earth...” he said softly.

“Yes, get over it. And pull up _now_!!!!” The man yanked on a small wheel in front of him and the ship reeled upwards, flying along a building directly ahead of us vertically. Once we cleared the building, Peter ordered, “Now land in the river there without killing us! Try to aim it so we drift over to those warehouses just beyond the bridge!” Peter was guiding the spaceman directly into the East River.

“Alright, everyone. Buckle in!” the spaceman said. Mini Peter promptly sat in the empty seat next to him and buckled himself in. “It was just a saying, kid, Jesus.”

“‘Safety first,’ Aunt May always says!” Mini Peter adjusted his helmet so it was strapped securely around his head. Peter walked back towards me, clinging onto the wall of the demolished spaceship for support.

“Grab my hand,” he said, “I got you.” I reached out towards him and he swiftly pulled me up and wrapped his arms tightly around my body.

“Don’t you need to hold onto anything?” I asked, concerned.

“Sticky feet, lame brain.” He teased.

“Shut up.”

The man’s voice cut our cute moment short. “AND 5, 4, 3—“ We all lurched forward and the front window of the spaceship shattered upon impact with the water. The East River soon began flooding the compartment. I could only make out blurry figures through the water, but it looked like everyone survived the impact. I saw the little legs of Mini Peter as he swum out of the ship and towards the surface promptly. The mystery man from space grabbed what looked like a walkman floating beside him and kicked his way out the broken front windows. Peter held onto me and swam us up towards air.

When we broke the surface of the water, we were bobbing right alongside a pier that was holding up a large, run-down warehouse.

“We’re here!” Peter exclaimed.

“We’re where?” I asked.

“The hideout! This is where I was leading us anyways so I thought if we were gonna be crashing somewhere in New York City in a mysterious spaceship, we might as well get there a little faster.” We all swam to a ladder leading up towards the warehouse and climbed up. Peter led us all into the abandoned building, which was filled with a few towers of scaffolding and a couch with a few springs sticking out of its cushions. Suspended in one of the upper corners of the warehouse was a small office room, and a tall set of stairs led towards it.

“Peter, where are we?” I asked him quietly.

“I used to come here all the time when I was first learning how my powers worked. I would use all the scaffolding as training to climb and the empty space gave me plenty of room to swing. And the couch I found on the street and wanted a place to sit. I’ll tell you more later. First, we gotta figure out this guy’s deal.”

Our person of interest was standing in the corner drying his hair off with a few dirty rags he found on the ground. Me, Peter, and Mini Peter approached him. We must have looked like we meant business because he immediately said,

“Okay, before you throw me into your big Earth prison or anything, let me explain why I’m innocent. Well, I’m not innocent in a lot of things, but there’s no reason you guys should be mad at me! I think.”

“Get on with it!” Mini Peter shouted.

“Right! Okay, my name is Peter Quill, but you’ve probably heard me around as Star Lord.”

“ _Another_ Peter? Are you kidding me?” I interrupted.

“Or Star Lord! That’s a pretty popular name for me, too. Lots of people know Star Lord. Ring any bells?” We were all silent. “Okay, great, don’t mind that. Anyways, I was just having a fine old time flying between jobs in my ship, the Milano, which you guys have already been familiarized with. All of a sudden, big crash and big flash and suddenly I wasn’t flying in space anymore but I was flying right for your city. And then you guys know the rest.” Peter and I glared at each other. Yet another consequence of us coming back home using the inter-dimensional teleporter.

Without warning, the ceiling broke open above us. Three figures fell to the warehouse floor across from us, except I recognized these three. Black Panther. Loki. And… another Peter. Only, I swear Black Panther was a man back in Germany with the whole superhuman civil war and this one had her mask off and looked a lot more girl. Loki looked pretty much like how I saw him on the news when he tried and to invade Earth back in 2012, but he definitely got a fashion upgrade. He was wearing a slick black dress with a long trail that slowly faded into green, and his signature golden horns seemed to emerge directly from his skull. And this Peter, well, he was also wearing a Spider-Man suit, but his was a lot dirtier than Peter’s, and the colors were more dulled. He stepped forward and a thick cajun accent exited his mouth.

“M’name’s Peter Parquette. More popularly known as   Le Araignée. I gotta feeling we’re all connected, mon chéri.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who are all these new versions of characters you love?? All will be revealed next chapter!!!!! Which will be posted within the next week and a half! I have free time which means more writing time!!!
> 
> As always, please leave a comment, even if it's short, about something you're liking or not liking about the fic. It helps me so much with writing new chapters and it's the best way to encourage me to keep on writing knowing that there are actually people out there who stay up-to-date with this fic.
> 
> Thank you all so much for reading! I hope you're enjoying it!


	36. An Abundance of Heroes

Peter and the cajun version of himself were off to the side bonding about the similarities between their mirror lives, so I took on the task of figuring out who was who with the rest of our inter-dimensional friends. So far, I had already met Star Lord and Mini Peter, but we also had the Black Panther who claimed to be Shuri, Prince T’Challa’s sister. She said she became the Black Panther after both her brother and father died at the U.N. explosion two years ago. And then there was Loki, who we all thought was the exact same Loki as ours, just from a different dimension, but then Spider-Kid asked if they were a boy or a girl.

“Sometimes I’m one, sometime’s I’m the other, sometime’s I’m neither, and sometime’s I’m both. I swear, you Midgardians know nothing of the complexities of gender,” Loki promptly answered. When Star Lord asked what pronouns they wanted us to use, they spat out, “And the obsession with pronouns! Asgardian tongue obliterates the necessity of pronouns. I guess the English ‘they’ works fine for me.”

So far, I had deduced that Loki’s just a version of Loki from a wildly progressive Asgard. Their tales of Thor’s very loose definition of sexuality and frequent male lovers particularly interested me, but Star Lord pulled me aside before I got to hear any of the juicy bits.

“Okay, so I know we got off to a bad start with me kinda crashing my ship into your city and nearly killing you, but I wanna start our friendship on the right foot. Also I want to have a friendship with you. Cause I have _a lot_ to say and no one to say it to.”

“I’m sure the friendship bit will grow the longer you’re stuck here. What’s up?” I asked.  


“Okay. Is Loki not, like… the hottest person you’ve ever laid your eyes upon.” I burst into laughter. “Don’t laugh at me! I just confided in you, we’re friends now. Friends don’t laugh at each  other!”   


“I’m sorry, it’s just, you pull me aside to urgently tell me something and that thing is that you think Loki is hot?”   


“It’s not just that they’re hot! I’m in love. I never believed in love at first sight. I’m a _big_ bachelor. You know the Milano? My ship sinking in that river just beyond that wall there? Okay, I feel like you’re cool, can I tell you some TMI stuff right now?”

“Go for it.”

“I’ve had sex with about every type of sentient organism you can think of on every surface of that ship.”

“Ew! But also impressive, but like ew! I was lying down on your ship’s bumpy floor earlier!”

“Oh yeah, those bumps, those were not part of the ship.”

“What do you mean…”  


“Male Glangorian cum is actually just molten iron. One night on Glangor gave my ship _many_ new iron decorations.”

“Why would you ever have sex with a guy with molten iron cum? How are you still alive right now?”

“Cause Glangorian abs are _literally_ made of iron also, how could I not? Also, it’s fine. Got a nasty burn right on my tongue but most of it went onto the floor.”

“Yeah, okay, I think I’ll stick to Earth sex for now.” I glanced at Peter, thinking about our unfinished business from right before I died. Star Lord followed my eyes.

“Wait, are you and that spider dude, like, banging?”

“What?! No! I mean, we’re boyfriends, but we haven’t… _banged_ yet, ya know?”

“No, that’s respectable, I get you. Good for you two, young love! Wait, why was I talking about Glangorian cum again? Oh, right! Loki! Like, look Gus, I’m not a very big commitment person. I just go planet to planet, job to job, blowjob to blowjob. But the second I laid eyes upon Loki, my world went KWABOOSH! Out the window! It’s just about them now.” Peter was exaggerating every movement with wild arm movements.

“Just talk to them! You’re a funny guy, be funny! Loki probably likes funny people, right? I don’t know, honestly. They’re a super villain from this dimension so who knows if they even have the capacity for laughter.”

“Hey Gus! Come meet Peter Parquette!” Peter called at me.

“I gotta go! Just try your best, you got this!” I said encouragingly to Star Lord. As I walked towards the two Peters, I noticed that Shuri and Mini Peter were racing each other up the scaffolding. It was good to know everyone was getting along.

“So this is another dimension’s version of me…”

“Peter Parquette, ’n’ you must be the Gus Peter won’t stop yappin’ ‘bout.” I blushed and shook Peter Parquette’s hand.

“Nice to meet you! Should I call you Peter or…”

“We talked about that already,” my Peter jutted in, “Parquette has been called Parquette a lot in his life so he doesn’t mind sticking onto the nickname in this dimension.”

“Gotcha! Well, it’s great to meet you, Parquette. I know you probably just told all of this to Peter, but how’s your life different? I love figuring out how all these dimensions change themselves up.”

“No worries, I also have an Aunt Maybel and Uncle Benjamin, but Uncle Benjamin passed right after I got my powers, too. Also, my powers were from a spider that got caught in some voodoo-enchanted bayou water, not some dolled up lab in New York City. The only other big differences I can think of ‘re that I’ve never found my own Gus. I also never told Aunt Maybel I’m bi, and I know y’all went through lots with your death ’n’ all to get to where you are now, but I sure hope my own Gus shows up soon where I’m from.”

“I’m sure he will. I really am the luckiest guy in the world…” Peter looked at me and smiled so large his big brown eyes crinkled up.

“It’s getting pretty late, I think we should all head to bed. Tomorrow let’s discuss plans on getting everyone back home, no?” Shuri said from atop the scaffolding.

Loki agreed, grumbling, “Aye, I agree with the cat woman. I look forward to getting an excuse to not have to speak with any of you for an extended period of time,” referring to our next few hours of sleep.

“I sure will miss you during that time, though!” Star Lord chimed in. Loki rolled their eyes and sauntered to the other end of the warehouse and conjured themselves a bed. Mini Peter took the couch and everyone else found their own private places around the warehouse to curl up on the floor. Peter reserved the office room above everything for us.

“So this is where Spidey got his start, huh?” I asked Peter as we settled into our small corner of privacy. Peter made us a nice padding of webbing to lay down on.

“Yeah, it used to be a storage warehouse, but like I said earlier I found it abandoned and took it over to train in when I first got my powers. I’ve never slept over in it though, so this is a first.”

“It’s kinda crazy, all of the stuff that’s happening with everyone out there.”

“ _Kinda?!_ Gus, I just tore these people away from their home dimensions.”  
“It wasn’t just you! It was both of us, don’t beat yourself up for it.”

“But it was! If I hadn’t screwed up the whole multiverse, none of this would have happened. I mean, that little kid version of me is barely 7 years old, he must be terrified!” Peter was hugging his knees towards his chest and I could tell he felt very guilty about everything. I shifted my body so that I was facing him and cupped his face with my hands. He moved his eyes up to look at me.

“Look, that mini-you out there is still Spider-Man in his dimension. Or Spider-Kid, I guess. He’s fought his own supervillains and has saved countless people’s lives, too. All of the people out there are no stranger to threats or fighting for themselves. This is nothing. This is just doing a little tinkering with whatever machine Tina Stark gave us and getting everyone home. Easy peasy.” Peter pulled out the inter-dimensional device Tina gave us from his suit and held it out between us.

“God, I hope someone out there is smart enough as her. Not even smart enough, they have to be smarter so they can fix whatever glitch is going on with it! I just don’t know how to do this, and I feel like everyone is looking up at me and all I wanted was to get you back!” He was choking on his own words and I could see tears forming in your eyes. I scooted myself even closer to him and wrapped my arms around him.

“Hey, hey, hey. No one out there blames you. No one is mad at you for doing what you did. Well, maybe Loki, but they’re gonna be mad at everyone no matter what’s happening. Also, is there a single part of you that regrets going to that other dimension and getting me back?” Peter pulled away from me, regret in his eyes.

“Wait, no, that’s not what I meant. Of course I don’t regret it, I just feel—“

“Shhh, Petey, it was rhetorical, silly. I know you didn’t mean that. My point is, what’s done is done and you’re happier now than you were before. We can find a way to make this right. I don’t want to make this all about me, but like, you get to kiss me again, isn’t that pretty awesome?” Peter giggled and wiped away the tears from his eyes.

“Yeah, it’s the awesome-est.”

“That’s what I thought. Now come here.” I pulled his face into mine and let our mouths slowly greet each other. We first just pecked at each other’s lips, but with each peck we clung onto one another longer and longer. His tongue slowly slid into my mouth and met my own. As he explored my mouth in what had been literally months for him, I let my hands rest on his lower back and pushed him towards me to the point where I fell back onto our bed of webbing and he was lying on top of me. I could feel his need to be touching every centimeter of my body, exploring everything and anything that he could. I forcefully pushed his butt down so his rock-hard dick was kneaded against mine. He got the message and began grinding against me. I could feel his spidey-suit stick to my pants as his precum soaked through the thin bright-blue fabric. He broke away from me reluctantly so that he could tear my shirt off, throwing it into the corner of the barren room. He wrapped his arms around my bare torso, embracing me into his warm, heaving body. I could feel his hands slowly slide down my back towards my waistband, finding their way to its front. After he unbuttoned them, my pants were swiftly torn off and thrown to the side. I lied there, entirely naked, throbbing cock, precum dripping onto my stomach, all for him to have. He was kneeling over me, straddling my legs, staring at me. I could see the hunger in his eyes and feel his need for my body in the air between us. Suddenly, he grabbed my legs and whipped them through the air above my head, exposing my hole to him.

“Peter…” I moaned out, “I don’t want to do this now. Not today.”

“I know…” he whispered as he leaned his body over mine, pressing the his chest against the bare underside of my legs, “Me neither. But can I do this?”

I felt a finger gently apply pressure to the outer rim of my hole, sending waves of pleasure I had never felt before through my body. I nodded eagerly, and he quickly double tapped the spider symbol on his suit so that it loosened and easily slid off of his body. His dick burst from the loose red and blue fabric and pointed directly at me in the air. It was glistening with precum in the moonlight streaming in through the window. He stared into my eyes as he slid his pointer and middle finger into his mouth, lubricating it with his spit. I felt the cold of the wet fingers against my warm hole once again, but this time they slid in. I gasped and my eyes went wide as I was stretched open by his fingers.

“Is it too much? Just tell me to stop if you want.” Peter said sweetly, instantly cutting away from the sexy-guy act into the caring, loving, boyfriend that I fell for.

“No, keep on going.” As he nodded, I could see a mischievous smile creep along his face. He slowly creeped his fingers deeper into me. Once there was nothing more to put into me,he curled his fingers upwards and gently massaged my prostate. My body went numb with pleasure and every one of my muscles were hit with waves of pleasure, causing them to relax and tighten all at the same time. I saw that he was furiously stroking his own cock with his other hand and I weakly reached down to do the same to my own, using my own precum as lube.

I arched my back and quickly said, “Peter, I—“ I couldn’t even finish my sentence before he whipped his whole body forward, allowing his mouth to envelop my dick. As he swiveled his whole head around my shaft, circling my head with his tongue, I felt him press even harder down on my prostate. His sticky hand let go of his own cock to intertwine his fingers with mine, squeezing my hand hard as he swallowed the warm, salty, load that my cum was pumping against the back of his throat. My body shivered with pleasure as he let his fingers slide out of my hole and he licked the tip of my dick while sitting back upright. I was about to ask him if I needed to finish him off, but ribbons of white cum attached his dick to my thigh. He looked down and chuckled.

“That was so hot I didn’t even need anything touching me to, ya know…” I laughed and reached out towards him, gesturing towards me. He followed my instruction and lied down against me, his sweaty body warming mine as a draft wafted in from cracks in the wall. I wrapped my arms around him, letting one of my hands rest on one of his rounded buttcheeks, giving it a little squeeze. I could feel his smile against my chest as he nuzzled into me.

“Goodnight…” He murmured, already drifting off to sleep.

“Nighty night.” I said softly back. My thoughts were becoming distorted as sleep set in and it was hard to form coherent sentences, but I mumbled out, “Peter, I love you.”  


“Love you too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took longer than expected to go up! I hope you enjoyed getting into ~sexy~ and ~lovey dovey~ times again cause we're gonna be going pretty plot heavy in the next few chapters if you couldn't tell...
> 
> As always, thanks for reading and leave a comment if you like (or don't like) what you see!!!


	37. Game Plan

“Okay, how did you all know that we were here though?” I asked as I gestured towards Parquette, Loki, and Shuri. It was the next morning and we sitting in a circle next to the couch eating some bagels Loki got for us. It was unclear whether they went out and bought them for us or if they stole them through magic means. Still, I hadn’t eaten anything since getting out of that tube back in the other universe and the taste of cold cream cheese on a warm everything bagel was the best thing that had ever touched my tongue in that moment, so I wasn’t about to interrogate Loki. Star Lord, however, was especially grateful of Loki. He was laying it on a little too thick in my opinion. Loki mostly hated it, but a small part of them seemed to get satisfaction from the attention.

“The transit energy around this building was off the charts, so my suit picked up on it right away and I came here,” Shuri said, answering my question.

“I’m sorry, transit energy?” Peter asked.

“Transit energy, you know…”

“We really don’t, I think you’re wildly overestimating how smart we are.” Star Lord said.

“The energy that’s released when matter transfers to a plane of its non-origin. This is _basic_ Wakandan physics we’re dealing with here.” We all shrugged. I could tell Peter was easing up knowing we had someone who could give Tony Stark a run for his money around.

“I mean, it ain’t hard t’see dat ship o’yours crash int’ the river. I jus’ follow where the trouble leads me,” Parquette chimed in.

“Aye, you were not exactly… discreet with your arrival here,” Loki uttered nonchalantly, “It caught the attention of many a police officer over the night. Do not fear, I dealt with them accordingly.” Peter sprung up from the floor.

“What did you do!” He shouted. Star Lord stood up as well, placing himself between Peter and Loki, trying to deescalate the situation.

“Hey, hey, hey, we don’t want to get them— get _anyone_ hurt today, okay?” Smooth, Quill, real smooth.

“Relax. You midgardians and all your quarreling! I simply laid an enchantment over the area surrounding us. Upon nearing it, any passerby will suddenly have no memory of why they were heading this way and get a strange desire of moving in the opposite direction.”

“Just to be clear, while you’re here working with us, no supervillain-ing, okay?” Loki rolled his eyes at Peter’s demands.

“Clearly, you couldn’t get on back on your own, else you wouldn’t be here right about now. I wouldn’t get too up ’n’ mighty if I were you.” Parquette said as he wiped a smear of cream cheese off his cheek.

“Well, do any of you have any brilliant ideas?” Loki said, irritated. Shuri responded right away.

“Well, obviously you opened a space-time rift.”

“Okay, I did used to love _Doctor Who_ when I was little, so I’m sort of following this bit,” Star Lord said.

“Whatever means you had of transporting yourselves between dimensions was flawed, and it opened holes between this dimension we’re all sitting in and the ones that we’re all from,” she said as she gestured around at the dimensional visitors in the group.

“If these are just holes can’t we just walk right back out through them?” Mini Peter said.

“It’s not that simple,” Shuri said, laughing, “they were opened for a brief second and sucked us all through, then closed right back up after.”

“Well, why don’t we just use the device that Peter and Gus used and all get back home?” Star Lord asked.

“Clearly, that device doesn’t work. Would it get us home? Yes. Would it also transport tons of other innocent people from other dimensions into our own dimensions? Yes.”

“Well then just _how_ do you propose we get back?” Loki asked, still annoyed.

“Oh, easy, I can make an inter-dimensional portal.” Shuri quipped. We all sat there, dumbfounded. “I mean, I’d need the proper tech, and all we have right now is an empty warehouse and a broken spaceship—“

“Hey! Don’t diss the Milano like that!” Star Lord protested.

“—at the bottom of the Hudson River,” Shuri finished.

“Okay, yeah, I can’t really argue with that.”

“We could always just steal what we need…” Loki calmly suggested.

“Loki! No!” Peter blurted out.

“I mean, ain’t th’ worst idea I‘ve ever heard,” Parquette muttered. Peter darted his eyes at him angrily. “Look! Just sayin’, if we took what we need from people who don’t deserve it, it ain’t the worst thing we could do.”

“Like Robin Hood!” Mini Peter quipped, “Take from the bad rich people and give it to good people!”  
I looked at Peter. He was clearly being torn up morally by this decision. “Hey, we could take some stuff from some bad people and then just return it when we get everyone back to their home dimensions,” I said softly, trying not to further upset him, “Is there anywhere you know that doesn’t really need… whatever it is Black Panther would need?”  


“Thereisoneplace,” Peter whispered. He looked up at me while I gave him an unamused look. He rolled his eyes and said again, louder, “There is one place, okay? Roxxon Energy Corporation. They have a lab in Brooklyn. I’ve already stolen something from there once. I had to, to save Gus’ life.” He gave my hand a squeeze.

“Jesus Christ, how many times have you died?” Star Lord said to me.

“Long story, I’ll tell you later.”

“Anyways,” Peter continued, “After I was forced to steal from them, I did some looking into them cause I felt bad about it all, and it turns out they do some pretty crappy things. Basically, we wouldn’t be doing harm by hindering the progress of what they’re researching in that lab.”

“Sounds good by me!” Shuri said, “I just cross examined what I need with Roxxon’s equipment stocks and we can get everything we need from there.”  


“How’d ya do that so fast?” Parquette asked.

“Computer in my suit. When I had to take on the mantle of the Black Panther I thought I could give myself a few upgrades.” She stood up. “Who else is with me? I have to go since I know what we need.”

“I know the layout better than anyone here, so I should go, too,” Peter chimed in and he stood up, “And we could use some backup by having another Spider around, what do you say, Araignée?” Parquette nodded and joined Peter, pulling his mask over his head as he stood up.

“Being the most powerful one here, I guess I must go,” Loki grumbled as they stood up, almost annoyed. I could tell Peter was tense about letting a super villain come along, but he wasn’t protesting, because we all knew Loki did have the widest range of abilities out of everyone.

“Then me, Star Lord, and Spider-Kid over here can hold down the fort while you guys go get everything!” I said, putting my arm around Mini Peter.

“Hey, um, I’m pretty powerful, too. I think you’ll need my skills out there,” Star Lord said defensively as he stood up, joining the rest. Shuri snorted,

“Good one! Come on, guys, let’s go.”

“Really! Don’t blow me over like this, none of you guys have ever been to space!” Star Lord was not resting up, and I could tell everyone was getting impatient. I caught Loki’s eye and gestured from them to Star Lord, urging them to say something. They rolled their eyes, then said,

“Quill, the reason you cannot come is because we need someone powerful enough to defend the children and our safe house while we are gone.” I decided I’d ignore the fact that they just grouped me with a 7-year-old cause instantly I saw Star Lord’s posture melt. 

“Really? I’m _that_ powerful? I mean, if you say so, obviously. Yeah, I’ll protect them!” I winked at Loki, thanking them, and then turned to Peter.

“Be safe, okay?” Peter wrapped his arms around me, letting his hands rest against by lower back.

“Always. It’ll be nice knowing that this time I go to Roxxon you’ll be waiting for me safe, sound, and alive when I get back.” I smiled and gave him a quick kiss.

“You got this!” I said to him as he walked towards Shuri, Loki, and Parquette. Peter and Parquette both leapt into the air, shooting web lines out in front of them, as Shuri lead them to Roxxon, leaping from scaffolding to rooftop. Loki trailed behind, levitating after them.

“They got this…” I said to myself softly, hearing the last of Peter’s web shooters within hearing distance shoot out towards their next destination.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can I just say... I've never made a bigger mistake than when I decided to have 4 characters all with the first name "Peter" together for half of an arc. Also, why did I decide to make Cajun Spider-Man? I write this with a Cajun slang words and phrases dictionary open on another tab while I write. Anyways, I hope it comes out some level of authentic!
> 
> Also, another note, since Loki uses he/him/his in the movies and most of the comics, I sometimes slip up while writing and accidentally use he/him/his instead of they/them/theirs. I try to be on top of it, but if I misgender Loki ever let me know! It's a total accident if so.
> 
> Lastly, thanks for reading and extra thanks to those of you who comment! It really has encouraged me on finishing this chapter and getting it out here ASAP. I'll start working on the new chapter soon!!!!


End file.
